Is My Mom Being Used As A Crypto “trade Mule”?

Hi everyone,

So my mom recently met this guy online a month or two ago who claims he started up a financial advisory company and used to work as a consulting director. He seems very good at making money trading crypto and has been teaching my mom how to trade.

Over the last week or so he’s helped her set up a crypto account and an on-chain wallet to store money in. She sends him money to his account directly through wire transfer from her credit Union. He pulls off the trades, then deposits her money plus winnings back into her account. He has also deposited roughly $20k of his own money into her account, which she then sends back to him.

She has put in $75k and made almost $50k in just over a week. She has not shared her private keys in her wallet with him or anyone else, so my obvious question is what is he getting out of this relationship?

He doesn’t seem interested or even able to steal the money from my mom’s account. He even advised her to never share her private keys to her wallet with anyone, including him.

Could he be money laundering through crypto trades using my mom as a trade mule? If so, why would he do this (maybe tax evasion)?

I only have a basic level of understanding crypto trading, so maybe this is all legit. If my suspicions are correct and my mom is unknowingly helping this guy break the law, what legal advice would you give my mom going forward?