虚拟货币渐成洗钱利器

    汇丰（HSBC）和渣打（Standard Chartered）退出洗钱业务的举动或许来得正是时候。在一些需要躲开监管视线、转移现金或洗钱的人们中间，一种网络虚拟货币——比特币（Bitcoin）似乎正在赢得青睐，日渐流行。

    如果你花点时间看看比特币的网络市场，就会发现比特币的用户从街头担心通胀的普通伊朗人，到倾向于用无迹可寻的货币收款的职业杀手和毒品贩子，形形色色，无所不有。如果比特币在国际市场上的汇率能稳定下来，有望最终进入合法的金融体系，威胁到众多银行以及Visa、万事达卡（MasterCard）等支付运营商的重要利润来源。

    上周，总部位于英国的两家银行汇丰和渣打分别遭遇天价罚款19亿美元和3.27亿美元，如此巨额的罚款几乎让人难以理解。两家银行被控帮助一些不择手段的演员转移和达成交易，违反了国际法和联合国制裁政策。按纽约总检察官办公室的说法，汇丰为墨西哥黑手党做了大量工作，渣打帮助伊朗政府达成了约2,500亿美元的石油交易，从德黑兰赚到了大量利润。

    但像汇丰和渣打这样在地下金融市场中努力争夺一席之地的状况并不少见。从瑞信（Credit Suisse）到瑞银（UBS），再到摩根大通（JPMorgan），全球几乎各大金融机构都曾在某些时候逾越雷区，为那些他们明知应列入黑名单的政府或个人的可疑交易提供便利。银行为什么要参与这类交易，个中原因显而易见——这些交易的利润极高。

    不过，由于政府、尤其是美国政府加大打击力度，如今银行要继续为“邪恶”国家或在西方臭名昭著的人物提供业务服务已变得困难多了。举例来说，对于与伊朗进行交易，奥巴马政府已向欧盟施压，要求将伊朗封锁在欧盟银行体系之外。最近，伊朗国内的银行被踢出了环球同业银行金融电讯协会（SWIFT）组织，要从外国银行向伊朗汇钱几乎已是不可能。至少目前看来，这一利润中心似乎已经向银行关上了大门。

    但罪犯和邪恶国家仍然需要转移他们的现金。于是，网络虚拟货币“比特币”悄然登场。如果你对这种货币还不熟悉，我们在这里简单介绍一下：比特币是一种财富存储形式和交换媒介，主要用于网上购买商品和服务。目前，比特币交易主要在互联网地下世界，即所谓的“深层网络”（Deep Web）中进行。相对于搜索引擎和一般互联网浏览器带给我们的互联网，“深层网络”就是它们下面的黑土。

    你可以舒舒服服地坐在家里的电脑前，在这个互联网地下世界中买卖从毒品到枪支的几乎任何东西。还可以通过一种比特币“搅拌机”洗钱。它就像是一个比特洗衣店,在这里比特币和现金都被会被洗“干净”。跟银行一样，这些“搅拌机”通常对这项服务收取1%的交易费。

    HSBC and Standard Chartered may have gotten out of the money laundering and sanction-skirting game just in time. Bitcoin, a virtual online "currency," seems to be gaining traction and legitimacy among those who need to transfer or launder their cash outside of the prying eyes of regulators.

    Spend some time in the sketchy online marketplace for this currency and you'll find that Bitcoin users range from the common Iranian on the street, who is worried about inflation, to hit men and drug dealers, who prefer to be paid in an untraceable currency. If Bitcoin is able to stabilize its value on the international markets, it could eventually creep into the legitimate world of finance, threatening major profit centers for both the banks and payment operators like Visa and MasterCard.

    The massive fines levied against British-based banks HSBC ($1.9 billion) and Standard Chartered ($327 million) last week were so big it was almost hard to comprehend. The two banks were accused of helping unscrupulous actors transfer and conduct business in violation of international law and UN sanctions. HSBC did a lot of work for the Mexican mafia while Standard Chartered enjoyed the comforts of Tehran by facilitating, as per the New York Attorney General's Office, some $250 billion worth of oil trades for the Iranian government.

    But HSBC (HBC) and Standard Chartered are hardly alone in grabbing a piece of the financial underworld. Nearly every major financial institution from Credit Suisse (CS) to UBS (UBS) to JPMorgan (JPM) have been fined at some point for facilitating questionable transactions for governments or individuals they knew they shouldn't be dealing with. It is understandable why the banks participated in such business – it is extremely profitable.

    Nevertheless, it has become much harder for banks to conduct business with rogue nations and unsavory characters as governments, most notably the US, fight back. In its dealing with Iran, for example, the Obama administration has pressured the EU to lock Iran out of its banking system. Iran's banks were recently cut off from the international "SWIFT" club, making it virtually impossible to transfer money to Iran from a foreign bank. This profit center, at least for now, seems closed to the banks.

    But criminals and rogue nations still need to move their cash. Enter Bitcoin, the online virtual currency. For those unfamiliar, Bitcoin functions as a storage of wealth and a medium of exchange for goods and services mostly available for purchase on the web. For now, Bitcoins are primarily accepted in the Internet underworld known as the "Deep Web," which is a sort of dark foil to the web brought to us by search engines and standard internet browsers.

    Here in this internet netherworld you can buy and sell almost anything – from drugs to guns – all from the comfort of your home computer. Money laundering can be conducted through one of the various bitcoin "mixers," like Bit Laundry, where bitcoins and cash are exchanged for "clean" ones. Like the banks, these mixers usually take a 1% transaction fee for the service.