Properties like real estate and agribusiness have been discovered by criminals as an
effective and clandestine way to launder money nationally and internationally.
Ownership of properties is obscured through shell companies, fake documentation,
and variations on family names listed on deeds. Legal mechanisms available to hold
property without disclosing the actual owner’s name make tracing money difficult.
Wealthy people, including foreigners, are buying property in the United States at a
brisk pace with few questions asked, even as border security is tightened against
poor immigrants trying to cross into the country. Figuring out whose money is
behind these properties and shell companies proves difficult.
According to Peter Alldridge, mass media depicts money laundering as bad,
interesting, and daring, but never explains exactly what it is, why it is done, or why
it is so damaging.1 This book explores the novel and known ways money is being
laundered in the world. The book reveals how new financial techniques used by
criminals are going ignored and undetected. Indeed, money laundering is an
international crime challenging the very sovereignty of nations.