The data on criminal stablecoin use tracks with what we see in chain analysis—but don’t conflate payment preferences with Bitcoin’s actual role in illicit activity. ETF flows show institutional demand is driving adoption for legit use cases, not crime.
It works a bit differently - governments "added more crimes", that's why more stablecoins were included in the report. Adding "illegal" payments, for example for crude oil caused an artificial spike in the stats
Stablecoins dominate illicit flows because they’re easy to off-ramp, but that’s a feature of centralized rails, not Bitcoin’s failure. Meanwhile, BTC’s ETF inflows hit $12B in April ’26—institutional demand is where the real liquidity grows.