Last year (early 2025) I had the opportunity to meet someone with first-hand experience in countering Russian-, American-, Azeri- and Cyprus-based money-laundering systems, exiled whistleblower John Christmas. The encounter felt unusual, unreal in fact as you come from different realities. One disclaimer beforehand:  I do not know his exact motives, but have referred to him multiple times, meanwhile sticking with my own arguments and legal basis, meaning that his opinions on the institutions from where he discovered fraud do not reflect mine per se.Yet there is a certainty that counts: His case of fleeing into exile after discovering fraud is not stand-alone, but connects to a broader pattern of disruption, and bears at least some connection with Maria Efimova’s whistleblowing at Pilatus Bank (Malta) and Daphne Caruana’s investigation of Egrant. Some of the examples found based on his observations and others concern money-laundering in Latvia at Parex Banka, ABLV, Ukio, leakages  at the European Central Bank, potential conflicts of interest in the EU, at the Bank of Cyprus, money-laundering channels from Ukraine, Russia, the US and Azerbaijan. This does not undo the progress of the EU as such but the cases are quite serious. What they reflect constitutes basically everything that is 'illiberal' about the current economic system.