Crypto News: CJNG Mexico Cartel Moved $26M to China Without Leaving a Trace

Key Insights:

• Crypto news reveals the CJNG cartel moved $26 million in Tether from Mexico to Chinese chemical suppliers with zero traceable wallet addresses.
• Cryptocurrency payments to Chinese suppliers grew 600% from $4.3 million in 2022 to $26 million in 2023.
• Mexican broker washed $5.4 million for CJNG using mixers and chain-hopping, hiding cartel wallet ownership completely.

Crypto news on Feb. 23, 2026, revealed how drug group CJNG in Mexico moved $26 million in digital money to Chinese chemical suppliers without leaving a trail police could follow.

The group’s leader, Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, known as El Mencho, reportedly died recently. But his organization used cryptocurrency called Tether to pay for chemicals needed to make the deadly drug fentanyl. Despite blockchain being called transparent, law enforcement cannot find a single wallet address connected to CJNG.

Crypto News: $26M Moved to Chinese Suppliers

CJNG sent approximately $26 million in Tether to Chinese companies selling fentanyl precursor chemicals between 2022 and 2025.

Payments grew 600%  in one year, jumping from $4.3 million in 2022 to $26 million in 2023. Research company TRM Labs shows 97% of over 120 Chinese chemical makers now accept cryptocurrency as normal payment. Digital money became the standard way to buy these chemicals.

How Tracking Works in Crypto | Source: TRM

The cartel used Tether, which stays around one US dollar in value. About 30%  of transactions happened on the TRON network, while 6% used Ethereum.

Bitcoin made up roughly 60% of total payments. These currencies allowed CJNG to send money across borders from Mexico to China faster than bank transfers. Regular wire transfers take days, and banks freeze suspicious funds. Cryptocurrency moves in minutes, and nobody stops it easily.

Total illicit cryptocurrency volume hit $158 billion in 2025, according to TRM Labs. But investigators cannot find specific wallet addresses that CJNG controls.

No public records show where the cartel keeps digital money, despite years of investigation. Everyone knows money moved, but nobody can prove who moved it.

Crypto News: Chain-Hopping Hides Cartel Funds

CJNG remains invisible through techniques such as mixers and chain-hopping. A mixer works like a washing machine for cryptocurrency. You put dirty money on one side with money from many others. Everything mixes together. Then you take clean money out. Nobody traces which coins came from which person.

Mexican money broker Meño was sentenced in 2025 for washing $5.4 million in cryptocurrency for CJNG across 13 US cities using mixers plus peel chains. Peel chains mean moving money through dozens of different wallets very quickly. After ten or twenty hops, the trail goes cold.

Cartels Using Crypto Isn’t Anything New | Source: X

Chinese Money Laundering Networks use cross-chain swaps, moving cryptocurrency from one blockchain to another, completely different blockchain. This breaks the trail because each blockchain is separate. Money flows through loosely regulated Chinese exchanges, where people convert to regular cash.

China Remains A Key Point | Source: TRM

The US government shut down the major mixer Tornado Cash in 2022. They stopped ChipMixer and Samourai Wallet in 2023. However, CJNG shifted to decentralized alternatives that nobody can shut down because no single company runs them.

El Mencho’s Death Changes Nothing As Network Continues

El Mencho’s reported death in Mexico during February 2026 might seem like it would stop operations. But CJNG operates as a decentralized franchise model. Different cells work semi-independently. One leader dying does not collapse the network. Cryptocurrency payment systems keep running.

CJNG was designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the US in early 2025. The government offered a $15 million reward for El Mencho’s capture. Despite pressure, cryptocurrency flows continued and grew. Sanctions make traditional banking harder. So, criminal groups rely more on digital money that governments cannot freeze.

FinCEN sanctioned three Mexican banks in June 2025 for washing drug money. They prohibited US transfers to these banks, including to any cryptocurrency addresses linked to them. This only works if investigators identify the addresses. Since CJNG leaves no traceable wallets, sanctions hit some launderers but miss core operations.

Blockchain promises transparency because every transaction gets recorded forever. But combined with mixers, privacy coins, and chain-hopping, this transparency becomes useless.

CJNG in Mexico exploited this gap by using permanent blockchain records to evade investigators, hiding ownership behind technical tricks. It made tracking impossible in the crypto news enforcement landscape.

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