Crowdfunding was essentially judged illegal in Hong Kong.
With the passage of the new national security laws in China, Apple Daily reports that a protester arrested for “participating in an unofficial primary election for the Legislative Council last summer.”
His organization crowdfunded donations on a U.S. charity website.
Part of the money raised was to be used to fund his bail.
Bail was denied when the judge was persuaded that the crowdfunding campaign was evidence of illegal money laundering.
The prosecutor argued that the funds would be transferred from a U.S. bank to a third party bank to the protestor’s organization’s bank account, claiming that this constituted “layering.”
The U.S. Treasury says that there are 3 stages to money laundering: “(1) placement, in which illicit proceeds are introduced into the financial system; (2) layering, in which the criminal attempts to distance the proceeds from the crime through a series of transactions; and (3) integration, whereby the illicit funds re-enter the economy disguised as legitimate funds.”
So far, the U.S. government has not equated (to my knowledge) crowdfunding to money laundering.
Crowd Funding News 