CONFLICTED Podcast Summary

Episode: How Money Laundering Took Over the World
Host: Thomas Small
Guest: Oliver Bullough (investigative journalist, author of Everybody Loves Our Dollars)
Date: April 7, 2026

Episode Overview

This episode delves into the hidden architecture of global finance that enables crime, corruption, kleptocracy, and tax avoidance. Thomas Small interviews Oliver Bullough to unpack how money laundering is not a separate criminal ecosystem, but a deeply embedded feature of the legitimate global financial system—used by tyrants, criminal cartels, and billionaires alike. Through a journey from Al Capone to crypto, Bullough exposes the staggering complicity of Western economies and the persistent failure of governments to fight financial crime. The discussion is candid, with real-world examples, historical context, and a critical look at how policies, innovations, and international pressures have shaped the modern underground world of money.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

The Global Financial System: Not Just for Criminals

• Interwoven Worlds:
  “There isn't a separate criminal financial system. There is just the global financial system.”
  (A: 00:05 - 00:55)
  Both host and guest frequently reiterate that the same legal structures enabling billionaires and corporations to avoid taxes are what criminals and autocrats use to launder money.

• Western Hypocrisy:
  “We have this sort of stated disapproval of autocracy and corruption, which was completely unmatched by our actions... These people were as integrated into our economies as any multinational corporation.”
  (B: 02:52)
  Oliver shares how his time reporting on post-revolutionary Ukraine unveiled Western willingness to facilitate, or at least tolerate, financial crime emanating from autocratic elites.

How Money Laundering Works

• Historical Roots and Evolution:
  The term “money laundering” did not originate with laundromats (though that’s the urban legend). Rather, it’s a metaphor for making “dirty” money appear clean, a process refined since the days of Al Capone (B: 11:08).

• Classic Schemes:
  Early laundering was basic: criminals would funnel illicit cash through businesses (like laundry shops or winning lottery tickets) to legitimate its origin.

  “My personal favorite example... buying lottery tickets for cash... That way, the money launderers could claim, 'Oh, no, we didn’t make the money from selling marijuana, we made the money from winning the lottery.'”
  (B: 12:32)

• Constant Arms Race:
  As laws clamp down, methods rapidly evolve:

  “You just took it [the cash] to a bank, handed it in and they gave you a check. That was it. That then was cracked down upon and they had to become imaginative and fly their money to Panama. And that was cracked down upon and they had to become imaginative... Now there is an incredibly elaborate, extraordinarily complex global criminal economy.”
  (B: 14:02)

Offshore Systems and the Globalization of Money

• Offshoring Origins:
  Most offshore financial structures were invented for wealthy individuals and corporations—not criminals. The criminal underworld simply piggybacks on the same systems.

  “There is not a single, like a criminal market and a legitimate market. You know, it is one market... If the money could be described as having a desire, its desire is to move around the place with the minimum of friction and the minimum of interference and scrutiny.”
  (B: 15:57)

• Jurisdictional Arbitrage:
  Law enforcement is national and fragmented, but money moves globally and seamlessly, outpacing democratic oversight and leaving Western governments toothless (B: 06:39).

• Kleptocrats & Autocrats use the West:
  Money from Russian oligarchs, Iranian elites, and others routinely flows into Western real estate and assets, undermining the “clash of civilizations” rhetoric (B: 06:39-09:40).

  “Where they spend their money rather gave the lie to what they were saying... south of France... Miami... London... Switzerland. The same is true in pretty much every autocratic regime.”
  (B: 06:39)

Why Governments Fail to Stop It

• Incentives and Reluctance:
  Despite universal agreement on fighting money laundering, there's always an incentive for some states or actors to enable it for profit.

  “Everyone wants to do something, but at the same time, everyone wants everyone else to do it so they personally can make money from... allowing rich people to evade those restrictions.”
  (B: 18:48)

• Alliances of Convenience:
  Criminals, kleptocrats, and the wealthy all benefit from opacity. The same shell companies and legal tricks serve anyone looking to avoid scrutiny (B: 18:48-22:22).

• Outsourcing Law Enforcement:
  Enforcement is often delegated to banks, who are motivated by profit rather than policing illicit flows, resulting in half-hearted compliance (B: 52:34, 54:48).

  "Financial institutions are not law enforcement agencies... They don't exist to stop criminal finance. They exist to make a profit. And so any system... that replicates that model of outsourcing... is always going to fail."
  (B: 52:34)

Contemporary Innovations: Cash, Crypto, and Financialization

• The Surprising Persistence of Cash:
  Even in digital economies, cash is still king for criminals.

  "The amount of cash in circulation just goes up everywhere year after year after year... Most of this goes overseas... It is being used essentially as the float for a global criminal economy."
  (B: 27:46, 27:59)

  Governments print massive amounts of high-denomination notes used almost exclusively by illicit actors:

  "There's more than $7,000 of outstanding US currency for every single person in the United States."
  (B: 27:59)

• Crypto’s Supercharge:
  Stablecoins and other cryptocurrencies have revolutionized the speed and anonymity of cross-border illicit transactions.

  "They are incredibly cheap to use, instantaneous for moving money from country to country, almost entirely unchecked."
  (B: 31:22)

  Cryptocurrencies now seamlessly integrate with traditional laundering methods, creating “fractal complexity” (B: 30:41-33:09).

Money Laundering’s Political and Geopolitical Nexus

• Case Study: Trump and Crypto (33:09-39:02)
  The Trump family and associates are alleged to be personally enriched by the expansion and deregulation of crypto (especially stablecoins), which are simultaneously used by America’s adversaries to circumvent sanctions.

  "[Trump and associates] are... involved in regulating crypto, involved in crafting the regulations around crypto, while also their families are profiting massively from that... You can call that what you like. A lot of people call that corruption."
  (B: 34:04)

• Chinese Underground Banking (39:02-46:54)
  To bypass strict capital controls, wealthy Chinese use sprawling, informal, global laundering networks—often dovetailing with criminal cash needs in the West.
  These networks move “value” via goods and trade, through systems reminiscent of medieval banking (hawala, Medici), making detection almost impossible.

  “It is much cheaper and more efficient now to launder money than it has ever been because of these Chinese groups. This is great for criminals. It means it is far more profitable to commit crime than it has previously been because the money side is just completely taken care of.”
  (B: 39:45)

Sanctions and Unintended Consequences

• Sanctions as Double-Edged Sword:
  Overuse of sanctions has led adversaries to build alternative financial systems, with Iran and Russia at the forefront, aided by Chinese networks and crypto.

  “Talking to Iranian businessmen about how they move money around despite sanctions... It’s as efficient as using the Western financial system... it is a sort of predictable result of sanctions... teaching your adversaries that they should create a whole new financial system which has been what’s happening.”
  (B: 48:11)

  The U.S.’s historical control via the Dollar is being eroded by the ballooning of these alternative value transfer systems.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "There isn't a separate criminal financial system. There is just the global financial system." (A: 00:05)

• "If you look at the money, if you look at what they do rather than what they say, they're in business with each other." (B: 06:39-09:40)

• "The amount of US currency in circulation doubles every decade... It's being used essentially as the float for a global criminal economy." (B: 27:59)

• "Every time with these incomplete techniques used against money laundering... you just encourage the criminals to come up with a new response." (B: 33:09)

• "So you have this...alliance of convenience between the wealthy citizens of rich countries...and criminals, which is that they all want to evade scrutiny in various ways." (B: 18:48)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Introduction & Themes: 00:05–01:43
• Globalization & the Crime-Finance Nexus: 04:45–09:40
• How Money Laundering Works - History to Now: 11:08–15:27
• Offshoring and Law Enforcement Gaps: 15:27–18:48
• Why Governments Tolerate It: 18:48–22:22
• The Role of Experts (e.g., Epstein): 22:22–23:40
• Financialization & the Old-School Power of Cash: 26:04–30:26
• Crypto & Stablecoins Enter the Scene: 30:26–33:09
• Trump, Crypto, and Political Power: 33:09–39:02
• China’s Underground Networks: 39:02–46:54
• Sanctions and Systemic Blowback: 46:54–51:02
• U.S. Hegemony, Illicit Finance, and Institutional Failure: 51:02–54:48

Conclusion

This episode offers a sweeping, candid exploration of how money laundering—facilitated by the very heart of the global financial system—remains the lubrication for the world’s most intractable problems: crime, kleptocracy, and geopolitical conflict. Through vivid anecdotes and historical depth, Oliver Bullough, with Thomas Small, exposes a world where laws are abundant but enforcement is willfully and structurally inadequate, where criminal creativity outpaces regulation, and where the line between wealth and criminality, legality and illegitimacy, is more blurry than most would like to imagine.

To learn more, pick up Oliver Bullough’s "Everybody Loves Our Dollars" and dive deeper via the Conflicted community (see show notes).