Gangsters’ paradise?

Washing a million crisp, cocaine-tainted banknotes is no easy feat these days. Walk up to a teller and attempt to deposit them in a bank and there’s a good chance you’ll be turned away and the police called.

You could, I suppose, call Saul, your friendly diamond dealer, and try to wash your ill-gotten gains through precious stones, but fencing those diamonds at close to what you paid for them will prove immensely difficult.

Although ‘bitcoin facilitates money laundering’ is a common refrain, enlightened ‘hodlers’ — as people who own bitcoin for the long term are known — understand that it’s a terrible way to launder money. For a start, bitcoin transactions are recorded on an open public ledger.

So what’s the name of the best money-laundering game in town? That’s an easy one: property.

Take Hong Kong, which is where China launders its money, and America, which is where the world launders its money.