$10M Binance Accounts Frozen as Song Shijie, Boss of Beijing’s Largest OTC Margin Trading Platform, Linked to Crypto “Pig Butchering” Scam

Song Shijie, the former chairman of Beijing’s largest off-exchange margin trading firm, has relinquished his claim to three Binance accounts holding about $10 million in cryptocurrency.

Court filings in Orlando, Florida, show that the accounts were frozen under a U.S. federal investigation that linked the funds to a “pig butchering” scam. The case highlights one of the most high-profile connections between Chinese financial fugitives and cryptocurrency fraud uncovered by American authorities.

Court documents show that Song agreed to forfeit his rights to the Binance accounts in order to avoid facing criminal charges in the United States. Investigators alleged that the funds were tied to a crypto “pig butchering” scheme, a type of romance-investment fraud where victims are manipulated into building trust before being lured into fake crypto investments.

This fraudulent model has gained traction across Asia in recent years and has increasingly drawn the attention of U.S. law enforcement.

In a separate development, the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) seized £16.7 million (about $21.5 million) worth of Song’s assets in London. The seizure included luxury properties, apartments, and bank accounts, which investigators concluded were derived from unauthorized securities trading in China and subsequent laundering activities in the United Kingdom.

Song fled China in 2021 after being targeted in a nationwide manhunt for illegal securities trading and market manipulation. He still owes ¥22 million (around $3 million) in regulatory fines imposed by Chinese authorities. While Western regulators have moved to seize assets linked to Song, the penalty in China remains unpaid.