On July 20, the Pudong New Area People's Court of Shanghai, China, announced a major case involving illegal foreign exchange trading of 6.500 billion yuan using stablecoins as a medium. The case revealed that Yang, Xu, and others, through operating domestic shell company accounts, provided stablecoins (with USDT as the trading medium) to overseas accounts of unspecified clients, thereby achieving cross-border fund transfers to obtain income. The suspects had been involved in illegal foreign exchange trading amounting to 6.500 billion yuan over the past three years. Among them, Yang was responsible for attracting clients and allocating foreign exchange funds overseas, while Xu managed the public accounts of 17 shell companies in China, processing an average daily capital flow of more than 10 million yuan, with a clear division of labor and close collaboration.

The disclosed case details show that at the end of 2023, Ms. Chen, a Shanghai citizen, needed to remit money to her daughter overseas. Restricted by the foreign exchange quota, she contacted an overseas "foreign exchange company" (the aforementioned domestic shell company A controlled by Yang and others). Following instructions, Ms. Chen remitted RMB to company A's account, and her daughter's overseas account then received the equivalent amount of foreign exchange. The "foreign exchange company" charged a certain percentage of the transaction as remuneration. For a long time, the criminal gang has been providing illegal exchange services overseas in the name of "collection and payment on behalf" through cross-border "matched trading."