OTC broker
A trader who exchanges cryptocurrency for cash or bank funds off-exchange, privately, and often without the checks a regulated exchange would apply.
Legitimate OTC desks exist to move large blocks of crypto without disturbing exchange prices. The problem is the unregulated end of the same trade: a broker who will take crypto of unknown origin and hand back local currency, for a fee, without asking.
The UN’s 2026 report on cyber scam operations describes the standard path for scam proceeds as mule bank accounts, conversion to virtual currency, movement through wallets, laundering by over-the-counter brokers, and reintroduction into formal banking. The OTC step is where the trail usually goes cold, because it is the point at which the money stops being a blockchain record and becomes cash.
Where it shows up
- Pig butchering — A months-long relationship built for one purpose: to get you onto a fake trading platform and keep you paying in.
- Fake investment platforms — A trading dashboard that shows everything except the one thing that matters — that no trade ever happened.
On the laundering side
where OTC desks sit in the laundering chain on our sibling site, Clean on Paper.