After Chen Zhi was captured abroad, the cross-border fund tracing surrounding the Cambodian Prince Group began to shift from a public opinion storm to substantial judicial actions. According to Caixin on October 28, various judicial jurisdictions have successively initiated asset disposal procedures for the Prince Group's assets. Several Chinese-language media outlets reported that over 90,000 bitcoins had flowed through networks associated with the Prince Group, causing this case to suddenly escalate from traditional “overseas real estate + gambling funds” to a cross-border accountability model involving a massive amount of on-chain funds. Behind this funding chain, approximately 30 entities in the British Virgin Islands (BVI) controlled by Chen Zhi have come to the forefront. Local courts in the BVI have officially commenced provisional liquidation investigations around these offshore companies, appointing Joint Provisional Liquidators (JPLs) to preserve and sort relevant assets. In common law practice, the JPL mechanism is often a "preliminary battle" before formal bankruptcy liquidation, freezing, investigating, and identifying suspicious assets to build a procedural framework for whether to proceed to formal liquidation and how to distribute among creditors. For Chinese victims, this round of procedural intervention from the BVI signifies, for the first time in public information, a possible path for “future claims to be declared in relevant procedures.” However, up to now, there is no evidence that the BVI has entered formal bankruptcy liquidation, nor is there any indication that the creditor declaration window has truly opened. The question then becomes sharp: amid the intertwined paths of criminal recovery, state confiscation, and offshore liquidation, can those Chinese investors caught up in the Prince's funding scheme truly convert their “on-paper creditor qualifications” into even a portion of recoverable actual payments through the BVI's provisional liquidation procedures.

BVI Court Takes Action: 30 Offshore Companies Enter Provisional Liquidation

Following Chen Zhi's capture and the successive initiation of cross-border recovery paths, the BVI court's actions have targeted the "central nervous system" of the entire offshore structure: around the approximately 30 BVI entities controlled by him, the court has appointed Joint Provisional Liquidators all at once. For ordinary investors, "JPLs" sounds like a prelude to bankruptcy declaration, but in the legal context of the BVI, it resembles an emergency brake—first stopping the vehicle and locking the books and assets, then deciding whether to fix it or dismantle and sell it. The core responsibility of the JPLs is to investigate the flow of funds and organize the balance sheet prior to formal liquidation and creditor distribution, avoiding asset transfer, concealment, or being outpaced by other procedures, rather than immediately initiating a final liquidation and compensation.

Because of this, the approximately 30 entities included in the JPL scope are essentially tied together into a "unified asset pool": regardless of what cross-border funds they were previously used to hold, they are now under the same investigation and preservation framework. For potential creditors, this means that the competition surrounding the BVI will no longer be fragmented disputes fought separately but will enter a collective platform procedure. According to common law jurisdictions, the JPL process accommodates all potential creditors without regard to nationality; if formal liquidation is initiated in the future and declaration is opened, Chinese victims could theoretically stand alongside investors from other countries at the same procedure door, submitting proof of losses and participating in collective ranking. However, in the existing public information, this door remains in a "preparatory state": the provisional liquidation investigation has been initiated, but there is no timetable for formal bankruptcy liquidation, creditor declaration, or distribution plans. For Chinese investors attempting to recover losses through the BVI, this collective procedure is both a potential entry point and the most critical but uncertain node in the entire cross-border recovery chain.

Clues of 90,000 Bitcoins Included in Investigation

For Chinese victims, the first thing to face behind the “not yet truly opened” BVI procedural door is an extremely complex funding chain. Several Chinese media outlets have reported that over 90,000 bitcoins once flowed through entities associated with the Prince Group; this single source claim at least reveals one direction: within the involved funds, cryptocurrencies are not just fringe material but one of the protagonists that must be directly addressed. The reports did not clarify whether these bitcoins are still controlled by the relevant BVI entities or their controllers; they merely indicated "once flowed through" this network. However, from the perspective of the Joint Provisional Liquidators, such a large-scale on-chain trace is sufficient to be included in the key investigation clue pool. The multi-layer account system built through BVI shell companies has allowed these coins to shuttle between different jurisdictions and convert under different account names. What the appointed JPLs in the BVI now need to do is to dismantle this bitcoin circulation trail, which has been layered in wrapping, along both the on-chain and book paths.

In liquidation practice, assets like bitcoins are generally viewed as identifiable and can be included in the asset pool. Once they enter the JPL-led process, it means they are no longer just "balances at some address" but potential liquidation assets. If the JPL can lock in key addresses or transaction paths, the next step often involves issuing requests for investigative assistance or freezing to potentially involved exchanges, over-the-counter brokers, and custodians, asking them to take restrictions on specific accounts or addresses according to court orders and anti-money laundering obligations; in some common law jurisdictions, if these institutions refuse to cooperate, they also face compliance risks. For industry platforms, this process effectively means being forcibly pulled into the cross-border liquidation process: once confirmed to hold on-chain assets related to BVI provisional liquidation, they may need to cooperate in locking, preserving, or subsequent disposal. Ultimately determining whether these 90,000 bitcoins can flow back into the creditor pool will depend on whether these on-chain clues can be transformed into freezing and transfer orders that various courts and intermediaries are willing to execute.

Chinese Victims' Creditors: From Possible Claims to Actual Distribution

For Chinese victims, the boundaries currently confirmed are actually very narrow: multiple media outlets have only paraphrased Caixin, using the phrase "it may be possible to declare claims in relevant procedures in the future," and no party dares to use terms like "those can already be declared" or "someone has already been compensated." Public reports also do not provide a timetable or specific process for creditor declaration in the BVI provisional liquidation, nor disclose whether they have accepted any individual investor declarations, let alone any signals of entering formal compensation distribution. In other words, discussing "declaring creditor claims" still remains at the level of institutional possibility and has not yet become a reality with an opened window.

Once the BVI process truly opens to ordinary creditors, in jurisdictions like the BVI, foreign individuals and institutions can generally participate as creditors in the liquidation, but the path is usually not straightforward: Chinese victims must first have a lawyer or agent confirm whether they are creditors of the relevant BVI entities, then submit identity documents, flow of funds, and proof of losses as required, fill out the creditor declaration forms, and deliver them within the deadline set by the court or Joint Provisional Liquidators. Even if successfully listed on the creditor list, a critical uncertainty will just begin to emerge between “successful declaration” and “actual distribution”: first, how large the pool of liquidatable assets actually is; how much of the actual controllable assets corresponding to that batch of over 90,000 bitcoins will truly fall under the control of BVI provisional liquidators; second, in cross-border cases, the same batch of assets often faces both criminal confiscation and civil liquidation, and the priority ranking between state recovery, secured creditor claims, and general creditor claims will directly determine whether ordinary investors are "at the tail of the queue for leftover scraps" or whether they will receive virtually no return. What truly decides how much Chinese victims can ultimately retrieve depends on how these variables will be clarified and adjudicated among multiple courts over the coming years.

Courts from Multiple Regions Involved: Possible Game Between Cambodia, BVI, and China

With Chen Zhi's capture, Caixin mentioned that "various judicial jurisdictions" have successively started asset disposal, meaning that starting from Cambodia, the court front surrounding the Prince Group's funding chain has unfolded in different countries. On one end are the criminal recovery, account freezing, and even confiscation procedures possibly led by local courts where the case occurred; on the other end is the BVI court appointing Joint Provisional Liquidators for about 30 offshore entities, starting civil investigations and preservation under bankruptcy law frameworks for the same or partially overlapping assets. This "criminal confiscation + civil liquidation" parallel structure requires each locked asset to queue anew among state recovery, specific secured creditors, and general creditors to determine who gains priority, which largely depends on which jurisdiction's procedures are recognized by other countries and take the lead in time.

At the mechanism level, Cambodian and other local criminal procedures focus more on holding individuals accountable and recovering unlawful gains, while BVI's JPL focuses on sorting assets and compiling a creditor list. The information sharing and procedural coordination between the two are not automatically generated. In cross-border cases, courts generally need to coordinate through judicial assistance, judgment recognition, or bankruptcy procedure recognition, but whether to recognize the other party's procedure and its efficacy is a matter of case-by-case judgment. For Chinese courts, if a large number of Chinese victims attempt to seek relief through domestic litigation in the future, they may choose among three paths when facing BVI's provisional liquidation and criminal confiscation from other countries: the first is to recognize the result of foreign liquidation or confiscation on a case basis, bringing domestic victims into that system; the second is limited cooperation, only coordinating at the information level while reserving independent discretion; the third is to reallocate controllable domestic assets through domestic civil or criminal proceedings separate from BVI’s or other courts' arrangements. Which path is adopted will depend on the specific facts of individual cases, the fairness of the procedure, and public policy considerations in the coming years, thereby directly affecting the actual recovery rate for Chinese victims in this multi-regional court game.

Offshore Crypto Funds Again Blocked: Compliance Signals from Platforms and Users

From the Prince Group case, the cross-border model relying on BVI's offshore structure plus the chain of over 90,000 bitcoins, previously viewed as a "gray buffer zone," has now been directly locked down by the Joint Provisional Liquidators, indicating that the offshore + crypto combination linked to suspected telecom fraud and online gambling funds is gradually being strangled by judicial collaboration. Without a determination on whether the BVI will enter formal bankruptcy, the advance appointment of JPLs for asset preservation and investigation is itself a preventive block against suspected illicit source funds. Once a liquidation precedent is formed, it will provide a template for other common law offshore jurisdictions to follow in similar cases. For trading platforms, OTC, project teams, and various matchmaking intermediaries, the warnings here are not abstract: with multiple countries increasing on-chain tracking, account freezing, and cooperation in cross-border asset recovery, if recognized for failing to fulfill KYC and anti-money laundering obligations, they may be drawn into the investigation chain at the criminal level and regarded in civil liquidation as “key interfaces” requiring cooperation in recovery or even bearing responsibility. Compliance costs and legal risks will be magnified. For Chinese victims, the current public information does not yet show that the BVI process has entered formal bankruptcy, nor has it opened a window for individual creditor declarations; the phrasing "may be able to declare in the future" is merely a possible path rather than a real channel. Whether losses can truly be retrieved through the BVI still depends on whether formal liquidation is initiated, how to prioritize between criminal recovery and civil distribution, and whether other offshore judicial areas will likewise reinforce the clearing and regulation of crypto funds. These variables will collectively reshape the boundaries and risk pricing of offshore crypto capital.

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