The Digital Executive Podcast

Guest: Hossein Berenji, Owner of Berenji Divorce and Family Law Group
Episode: Hidden Crypto and High-Net-Worth Divorce | Ep 1174
Date: December 22, 2025
Host: Coruzant Technologies

Overview

This episode explores the intersection of digital assets—particularly cryptocurrency—and high net worth divorce. Host of The Digital Executive, a showcase for tech leaders and innovators, interviews Los Angeles attorney Hossein Berenji, known for handling complex, high-value divorce cases involving intricate digital and crypto asset disputes. Berenji unpacks why crypto has become a favored tool for asset concealment, the legal system’s challenges in keeping pace, and how forensic investigations are evolving to meet this technological arms race.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why Hidden Cryptocurrency Is Rising in High Net Worth Divorces

• Appeal to the Wealthy:
  • Cryptocurrency’s inherent volatility and risk profile attract those with significant disposable income.
  • “The nature of the investment lends itself to people who are wealthy and can afford that risk.” —Hossein Berenji (01:42)
• Ease of Transnational Transactions:
  • Crypto allows for nearly frictionless, cross-border movement of funds—valuable to those seeking to bypass banking restrictions.
  • “This allows people to move around money. And typically the people who have the ability or will need to move around money like that are wealthy individuals.” —HB (02:37)
• Innovation and Early Adoption:
  • Wealthy individuals are often on the cutting edge of investment vehicles, adopting non-traditional assets ahead of the mainstream.

2. Legal System’s Struggle to Keep Up with Digital Asset Innovation

• Laws Lagging Behind Tech:
  • California’s recent digital financial asset law is a significant step, finally codifying how digital assets like crypto should be treated, including discovery obligations and regulations.
  • “There is always a delay. So I’m always looking for trends in the next innovation in digital currency and the way it’s stored and treated and the way it’s traded as well.” —HB (04:15)
• Constant Change:
  • As technology for storing and trading digital assets evolves (e.g., wallets, exchanges), the law struggles to adapt, creating challenges in asset identification and valuation during divorce.

3. Techniques for Hiding (and Finding) Crypto Assets

• Asset Concealment Strategies:
  • Use of cold wallets (offline storage), privacy coins, and decentralized exchanges complicates detection.
• Tracing Methods:
  • When assets are in centralized exchanges, legal teams can subpoena them (e.g. Coinbase) for records, making discovery easier.
  • Cold wallets and decentralized platforms necessitate deeper forensic work, such as combing through hard drives, electronic devices, and tracing banking transactions.
  • The process often starts with routine discovery, but escalates to forensic expertise if a party is untruthful or refuses disclosure.
  • “If we have certain indications that money’s been hidden…try to get access to their electronic equipment…then we have a forensic in the forensics go through their electronic equipment and find traces of trades, traces of investments.” —HB (08:23)
• Client Collaboration:
  • Clients play a key role, often providing critical clues about potential hidden assets based on their suspicions or information they’ve overheard.
• Pursuing Reimbursement:
  • Even if assets are liquidated or transferred overseas, courts can often “offset” lost assets against others in the settlement.
  • “Time doesn’t really hurt you…because if an asset is disposed of, you can always go back and try to get that particular reimbursement on another asset.” —HB (10:08)

4. The Future of Divorce Law Amidst Tech-Driven Wealth

• Technology’s Dual Edge:
  • Enables faster wealth creation but simultaneously makes asset tracking more complex for attorneys.
  • “Our job gets harder…It was much easier to subpoena a bank and find assets…But now it’s getting harder and I think it’s going to continue getting harder and we have to become more innovative and use more experts to try to untangle the web of financial deceit that happens through cryptocurrency.” —HB (12:41)
• Wealth Disparity and Legal Practice:
  • Growing wealth gap and shrinking middle class are changing the landscape of family law. More consolidation of law firms is anticipated, with fewer complex cases requiring specialized attorneys.
• Changing Social Norms:
  • Decline in marriages and rise of prenuptial agreements are shifting the demand for high-stakes divorce litigation.
  • “There’s definitely less marriage that’s happening right now. And people, a lot of people getting married are having prenups. So that in itself changes the practice, family law.” —HB (14:18)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “The nature of the investment lends itself to people who are wealthy and can afford that risk.”
  —Hossein Berenji [01:42]

• “The laws always kind of step behind technology…only recently there’s a digital financial asset law that was passed in California which closes a lot of loopholes on cryptocurrency and it codifies its treatment like other financial instruments under the law.”
  —Hossein Berenji [03:55]

• “The more an individual’s trying to hide it, obviously it’s more difficult and…it takes…more time to be able to unveil what’s being hidden.”
  —Hossein Berenji [09:40]

• “As technology increases, our job gets harder…and we have to become more innovative and use more experts to try to untangle the web of financial deceit that happens through cryptocurrency.”
  —Hossein Berenji [12:41]

• “There’s definitely less marriage that’s happening right now…and people getting married are having prenups. So that in itself changes the practice, family law.”
  —Hossein Berenji [14:18]

Timestamps for Important Segments

• 01:42 – Why high net worth individuals gravitate to crypto and how it aids in concealment.
• 03:47 – How the law is evolving (slowly!) to handle digital financial assets.
• 05:27 – Practical steps spouses use (e.g., cold wallets, privacy coins) to hide crypto, and how legal teams/forensic specialists trace them.
• 08:23 – The role of forensics and “following the money” in investigations.
• 11:47 – The future: tech as both opportunist and obstacle in divorce, and the impact of changing wealth distribution.
• 14:18 – Prenups, declining marriage rates, and their effect on divorce and the legal profession.

Conclusion

Hossein Berenji offers a pragmatic and clear-eyed look at how digital technology—especially crypto—has complicated the already fraught process of high-asset divorce. Litigation is becoming a technological arms race, requiring constant evolution in legal and forensic strategies. As financial assets become more decentralized and harder to detect, attorneys and clients must work more closely with tech experts to ensure a fair and thorough accounting. Meanwhile, broader shifts like wealth disparity and evolving social expectations are reshaping the landscape of family law.