• Crypto is funding businesses in China that supply fentanyl, Senator Elizabeth Warren warned.

• Digital currencies could be funding $540 billion worth of fentanyl pills on the market, per Elliptic data.

• That comes as the US battles an opioid crisis, with fentanyl driving a record in overdose deaths in 2022.

Senator Elizabeth Warren this week called for greater regulation of the cryptocurrency market as a recent report shows digital currencies are being used to fund the fentanyl trade in China.

At a Wednesday hearing at the Senate Banking Committee, Warren pointed to crypto's use among Chinese businesses that produce and sell fentanyl, citing statistics from a recent Elliptic report.

Researchers from the blockchain analytics firm found that 90% of Chinese companies that supplied fentanyl accepted payments in cryptocurrency.

Crypto wallets owned by these companies have already received $27 million in payments, an amount that could potentially be used to supply up to $54 billion in fentanyl pills in street value, per Elliptic's analysis.

"That is enough fentanyl to kill nearly 9 billion people, all paid for by crypto," Warren said.

Warren's calls for tighter controls come as the US battles an opioid crisis, with overdose fatalities notching a new record in 2022, according to the Center for Disease Control. Fentanyl — a synthetic opioid that's up to 100 times more powerful than morphine and 50 times more powerful than heroin — is suspected to have been involved in most of those, accounting for most of the drug overdose deaths in 2021.

Warren, a long-time critic of the crypto industry, has also pushed for more regulation for digital currencies as their role in criminal activity becomes more clear. Illicit crypto transaction volumes hit a new record of $20.1 billion last year according to the blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis.

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