North Korea launders Binance funds with Elon Musk memecoin, report

Brief

By Dextape Desk · November 9, 2026

Analysts at Elliptic say North Korea-linked hackers are moving money taken in a Binance attack through memecoins on the TRON, Solana and NEAR networks. Roughly $430,000 in NEAR went toward creating six animal-themed tokens, one promoting Elon Musk for president in 2028. Elliptic argues the coins served laundering because outside traders were absent, purchases were funded by earlier linked proceeds, and trading stopped after a short period. Each launch costs about $90, and the coins draw little notice while adding steps that slow investigators. Funding reportedly came from a wallet tied to the TraderTraitor group, which held about $43.7 million in NEAR. Elliptic also saw the same method after last year's $1.5 billion Bybit hack, when at least $24 million moved through TRON-based memecoins.

Why it matters: It shows how stolen crypto can be routed through low-cost memecoin launches on several blockchains, complicating tracing for investigators.

Mentioned: Solana, Binance

Summary by Dextape, based on reporting by Protos. Machine-written from Protos’ report and checked against it · How Dextape writes