China Moves to Confiscate 61,800 Bitcoin Tied to a $5.7B Fraud Scheme
October 22, 2026
Beijing Stakes Its Claim to a $5 Billion Bitcoin Stash
Chinese prosecutors have formally asked a court to confiscate more than 61,800 Bitcoin tied to one of the largest investment frauds in the country’s history. The Tianjin Second Intermediate People’s Court accepted the request on October 13, according to CoinDesk, citing Chinese outlet The Paper. The court has opened a six-month window for victims and other interested parties to join the case. At current crypto prices, the coins are worth roughly $5 billion. That makes this one of the most valuable asset-recovery cases ever to reach a courtroom, in any country.A Fraud That Raised 40 Billion Yuan From 102,000 Investors
The case centres on Qian Zhimin and her company, Tianjin Lantian Gree Electronic Technology. Prosecutors say the firm sold unlicensed wealth-management products across China between 2014 and 2017, promising to protect investors’ principal and pay unusually high returns. Those promises pulled in more than 40.378 billion yuan, about $5.7 billion, from more than 102,000 investors. Victims lost nearly 20 billion yuan when the scheme collapsed. Prosecutors say the money never went into real businesses. It was used to repay earlier investors, fund fake investment projects, buy Bitcoin, and pay for property, cars and jewellery. Qian fled China in 2017 and later settled in the United Kingdom.Why the Coins Are Sitting in Britain, Not China
The Bitcoin is not in Chinese hands. London’s Metropolitan Police seized it after Qian’s activity came to light in Britain, in what officers described as a record seizure for the UK. British authorities also took bitcoin cash, bitcoin gold, bitcoin SV, XRP, dogecoin, cash, jewellery and investment holdings linked to the scheme. In November 2025, Southwark Crown Court sentenced Qian to 11 years and eight months in prison for money laundering offences. That created an unusual situation. The crime happened in China, the victims live in China, but the assets are controlled by a British court. The new Tianjin proceeding is Beijing’s attempt to establish, under its own law, that the coins are the proceeds of crime and belong to the victims.
How a Confiscation Case Actually Works
A confiscation proceeding is different from a criminal trial. The court is not deciding whether someone is guilty. It is deciding whether specific assets are illegal gains and, if so, what should happen to them. In China, prosecutors apply to a court to have the property declared the proceeds of crime. The court then publishes a notice so that anyone with a claim on the assets can come forward within a set period, in this case six months. Victims who do not join can still seek refunds from whatever is recovered. The practical goal is to produce a formal ruling that identifies the victims and quantifies their losses. That ruling can then be presented to foreign courts holding the assets, which is exactly what matters here.The UK Court Has Already Handed China a Lever
Timing is not a coincidence. On October 12, London’s High Court ruled that Chinese law, not English law, governs the victims’ claims to the seized coins, as Digitap’s report on the UK ruling over the 61,000 seized Bitcoin says. Mr Justice Turner found that the victims “parted with their money in China” and that they “were likewise suffered in China,” according to the published judgment. One day later, the Tianjin court accepted the request to confiscate the Bitcoin. The two decisions now fit together. If Chinese law decides who owns the coins, a Chinese court ruling that the Bitcoin belongs to defrauded investors could carry real weight at the next London hearing. The Crown Prosecution Service has said a further hearing will determine whether any victims can establish an interest in the Bitcoin.Victims Have Been Pushing for This Since 2024
Investors have spent years asking Beijing to step in. In April 2024, a victims’ group wrote to China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Public Security, asking the government to negotiate with the UK to return the coins, according to Cointelegraph. The group gathered almost 2,500 signatures. Their worry was simple. When the Bitcoin was seized, it was worth only a small fraction of its current value. If victims are treated as ordinary creditors, they may only recover what they lost in yuan years ago, while the state keeps the gains from Bitcoin’s rise. The Tianjin case gives those victims a formal channel for the first time. Lawyers for some UK-based claimants are also seeking to appeal the High Court ruling, so the legal fight is far from over.What Could Happen to the Coins Next
Nothing moves quickly. The Chinese window runs for six months, the UK appeal process could take longer, and the London court still needs expert evidence on Chinese property law before it rules on ownership. Three outcomes appear possible. The coins could be returned to victims through a Chinese redress process, retained by the UK under its civil recovery rules, or split between the two under a negotiated arrangement. Any eventual sale of a stash this size would be watched closely by traders following crypto news today, although neither government has proposed one.A Test of Whether Borders Still Matter in Crypto
The deeper story is about jurisdiction. Bitcoin can cross borders in minutes, but the rights of the people who lost money stay rooted in where the fraud happened. China’s move signals that it intends to assert those rights through its own courts, rather than leaving the outcome entirely to a judge in London. For the 102,000 investors, the case may decide whether crypto’s borderless design works for victims or against them. For governments, it is becoming a template for how two legal systems divide an asset neither of them created.
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Madiha Riaz
Madiha is a seasoned researcher in cryptocurrency, blockchain, and emerging Web3 technologies. With a background in organic chemistry and a sharp analytical mindset, she brings scientific depth to decentralized innovation. Since discovering crypto in 2017 and investing in 2018, she’s been uncovering and sharing deep insights into how blockchain is redefining the digital asset landscape.
