A former internet cafe manager who dropped out of junior high school 15 years later amassing a fortune of $14 billion.$BTC 。

It sounds like a wish-fulfillment story, but it's true.

Caixin today disclosed details of Chen Zhi's assets in China. In addition to the Prince Group, which is well-known, he also holds a game company in Xiamen.

This company mainly develops mobile games and also holds a 70% stake in a Chongqing-based equity investment fund management company.

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Why do telecom fraud tycoons own gaming companies?

From private game servers to a telecom fraud empire, Chen Zhi's rise to power is actually a fairly typical example of the evolution of the black market.

He was born in Lianjiang, Fujian. After dropping out of school in the second year of junior high, he worked as an administrator in internet cafes in Guangdong and Jiangsu. The turning point came after the game (Legend of Mir) became popular. He formed a team to build a private server for the game and earned his first pot of gold.

This is actually the path many people took back then: pirated game servers, no copyright costs, as long as there is traffic, you can monetize it.

In 2011, he went to Cambodia and started in real estate. In 2014, he spent $250,000 to immigrate to Cambodia through investment, transforming himself from a "black market boss" into a "legitimate businessman."

Prince Group was established in 2015, with businesses spanning real estate, banking, and retail. On the surface, it is one of Cambodia's largest conglomerates, having received numerous awards.

But behind the scenes, they built closed parks to engage in telecom fraud, pig butchering scams, and human trafficking.

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The magical origin of 127,000 Bitcoins

In October 2025, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted Chen Zhi and seized 127,271 bitcoins he held, which were worth more than $15 billion at the time.

Lazy Orange investigated where these coins came from: According to an investigation by blockchain analytics firm Elliptic, these coins originally came from a mining company called LuBian.

In December 2020, LuBian was hacked, and 127,000 bitcoins were stolen, worth $3.5 billion at the time.

Hackers exploited a vulnerability in the algorithm that generated their keys to steal the coins, which disappeared for four years until they were transferred again in June 2024.

In the end, these coins ended up in Chen Zhi's hands.

The indictment shows that Prince Group operated Bitcoin mining in Laos under the name "Warp Data Technology," and transferred the mined coins to Chen Zhi's wallet through a money laundering hub in Cambodia.

The entire chain is as follows: defrauding victims of money via telecom fraud → guiding victims to invest in fake crypto platforms → laundering money through Bitcoin mining → transferring funds through more than 100 shell companies.

Even more outrageous, Chen Zhi couldn't remember his Bitcoin wallet's mnemonic phrase, so he wrote the password on a piece of paper and put it in the vault. When US law enforcement cut open the vault, they got the note, and all his assets were transferred away instantly.

Bitcoin, which claims to be "decentralized and absolutely private," is as fragile as a piece of paper in the face of the physical world.

The so-called "anonymity" has been broken.

Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis has successfully located four Bitcoin addresses controlled by Chen Zhi through on-chain data tracing. These addresses received a total of over $1.77 billion in Bitcoin over the past two and a half years.

A telecom fraud mastermind used Bitcoin to launder money, but was ultimately betrayed by on-chain data.

This incident serves as a serious wake-up call for the entire cryptocurrency industry: "Anonymity" does not equal "security," and "decentralization" cannot prevent law enforcement from using physical means.

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Game companies are fronts for money laundering.

Going back to the beginning, why did Chen Zhi want to hold shares in the game company in Xiamen?

Lazy Orange thought about it and realized that the gaming industry is indeed an excellent channel for money laundering. Virtual currency transactions, player top-ups, and overseas distribution—every link can generate cash. Legitimate gaming companies can open overseas accounts, and funds flow between domestic and foreign markets, making regulation very difficult.

From private servers to legitimate game companies, Chen Zhi has always been operating in the gray area of ​​the game industry.

A 2023 Chinese court ruling revealed that the online gambling companies associated with Prince Group were involved in cases exceeding 5 billion yuan. However, Chen Zhi himself still holds senior management positions and shares in multiple companies, many of which continue to operate normally.

The gaming company disclosed by Caixin is likely just the tip of the iceberg.

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Chen Zhi has been arrested, but I don't think the problem is over yet.

On January 7, 2026, Chen Zhi was arrested in Cambodia and deported back to China. His asset disclosure reveals a much larger problem.

How many seemingly "normally operating" companies are actually fronts for black market activities? Chen Zhi's story tells us that cryptocurrency is not a lawless zone, on-chain data can trace everything, and physical law enforcement methods are always more direct than technology.

In the 15 years before his arrest, he transformed from a criminal gang leader into a model of social responsibility. The people who protected him and the channels that helped him launder his identity are perhaps the ones who should be truly questioned.