This is interesting to me and I see why it would work in a place with lower state capacity but in more developed countries it’s not a great strategy. You want your money laundering to operate through high volume cash businesses. When I lived in Seattle I used to sometimes go to a sketchy cash-only teriyaki joint. The food was great and they were always filled with paying customers. Sadly, they were later caught and shut down.
They were fencing stolen iPads! I assume they were also laundering the stolen iPad money through their teriyaki cash flow, but it’s easier to get away with that if you actually have teriyaki cash flow.
