FIFA World Cup organizers are reportedly contemplating transferring this yr’s match out of Mexico after the dying of a crypto-laundering Mexican cartel kingpin led to a wave of violence from his supporters.
Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, in any other case often known as “El Mencho,” ran the Jalisco New Era Cartel (CJNG) and was killed on Sunday throughout clashes between his group and Mexican authorities.
The 59-year-old was reportedly injured throughout a firefight within the city of Tapalpa, and died whereas being transported to Mexico Metropolis.
His dying resulted in an outpouring of violence from supporters. This included the burning of autos and buildings throughout the nation, together with in Guadalajara, a scheduled host of this summer season’s World Cup.
Because of this, rumours started to flow into that town might be pulled from the match’s listing of venues. Certainly, the host of Ticket Discuss, Scott Friedman, claims a contact inside FIFA knowledgeable him that video games might be moved out of Mexico if the state of affairs doesn’t enhance within the subsequent week or two.
Bitcoin investor and personal fund founder Mike Alfred additionally claimed that “credible chatter” knowledgeable him that the cartel violence has led FIFA to contemplate transferring video games slated to happen in Mexico to the US and Canada.
🚨 BREAKING: The cartels at the moment are reportedly focusing on and destroying civilian websites throughout Mexico following the killing of cartel chief El Mencho.
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) February 22, 2026
The violence has led to nations issuing warnings in opposition to travelling to affected areas of Mexico, and the US warning its residents within the Jalisco area to hunt shelter and keep inside.
FIFA is but to publicly touch upon the state of affairs in Mexico. Protos has reached out to FIFA for remark and can replace this piece ought to we hear again.
El Mencho laundered drug funds with crypto brokers
Cervantes based the CJNG after working his means up the cartel ranks, killing rivals alongside the best way. It was a notoriously violent, closely armed group that has been liable for quite a few massacres.
The drug lord was designated as a Kingpin in 2015 and his drug trafficking enterprise was recognised as some of the highly effective felony teams in Mexico.
The US reward for info resulting in his arrest was set at $15 million.
Research led by TRM Labs discovered that the CJNG has been using crypto to transform drug funds into stablecoins. It was then despatched to numerous wallets, withdrawn from exchanges, or spent as crypto.
In 2022, the Drug Enforcement Administration reportedly found that the CJNG had used Binance to maneuver as much as $40 million value of cryptocurrency made by its cocaine and methamphetamine gross sales.
A Mexican dealer was sentenced to eight years in jail for organizing a sequence of crypto laundering hubs throughout the US that took money from the CJNG’s drug gross sales and transformed it into crypto.
TRM Labs has additionally documented how Chinese language cash laundering brokers assist out these cartels, in addition to Chinese language suppliers that promote them drug-related chemical compounds in trade for crypto.
