Money-laundering on the rise

When credit is tight, organized crime will step in and provide investment money for legitimate businesses. For the first half of the year, 15,000 suspicious transactions have been tracked in Italy, up 52 percent from a year earlier, and exceeding the total for all of 2008. From Bloomberg:

Mob arrests have underscored the growing role of the mafia and money laundering in the legal economy. A sweep against the 'Ndrangheta, Italy's wealthiest organized crime group, netted more than 300 suspects last week and showed how the organization has taken root around Milan, the country's financial capital.