Questions Regarding Global Meth Production in 2024

[Methamphetanonymous]

I'm editing this down per the rules... unfortunately the location names are necessary for the questions I have but are limited to nations and one capital city. I'd really like to be able to make note of the single price per weight anecdote I was told to help illustrate my confusion as I have not bought meth in several months and don't know the market here let alone another country. I'll try to illustrate my point without specific price

Mention of synthesis routes is needed as it's the question I have. I'll see what I can cut out but I am not soliciting advice nor providing advice to manufature illicit substances.


Hello, I've stumbled upon a question that I'd like to find some sort of clarity if not a definitive answer to for the book I'm writing about methamphetamine in the 2020s

This is not going to be a rehash of of the same question same answer back and forth regarding the cartel and whackadoodle journalist Sam Quinones so called new meth. All available evidence points to multi-precursor ladder to P2P reductive animation method producing an enantiomer racemate which then undergoes chiral resolution for purification to a 95% plus dextromethamphetamine yield with minimal waste. I buy it, maybe some magical trace amine is throwing off the buzz of every 50-60 year old burnout who barely can remember the 90s anymore- don't care.

An interview subject of mine however who lives in Canada picks up a product in Vancouver. She told me with certainty that she buys 28grams of supposedly meth at a price I don't think I believe or am suspicious of and claims it is synthesized in China and flown into the country.

I'm skeptical but curious. On one hand the price tag she named is suspicious even in 2024. If both the price is true and the story about manufacture in China and flown in... there's no way it can be sold cheaper than Ive ever heard and then halfed.
Beyond that having access to that kinda weight and picking up in a major city may make it plausible that her distributer knows where it's coming from.... but I've never heard of China producing meth on their home turf and would have thought the CCP would come down on that hard- hence why they sell pre-pre-pre-precursors to the cartel and not synthesized product.

If China isn't the supplying, then is it all being moved by the cartel like the lower 48s supply?

Follow up question, I was under the impression pharmaceutical companies have employed chemical methods in their pseudoephedrine that both makes it so extraction is logistically impossible without a respectable lab, as well as chemical compositions that hault any reduction reaction instantly, and pseudo is and has been dead even as a niche in the US.
Is that the case of cold pill manufacturers in Canada as well, or is there still a meaningful presence of clandestine chemists up North making small batches of pseudoephedrine reduced meth? Is there good recent data available indicating testing results on meth siezed in Canada?

And final question: Europe. I believe an interviewee who I could not verify of course claimed that methamphetamine manufacturers in Europe all utilize the cartels P2P and enantiomer resolution production steps, and were shown how to do this by chemists from Mexico. I don't even know where to begin to find law enforcement or independent testing results on siezed product in Europe.

Bonus question: Yaba in East Asia has been around for a while now, how is Yaba synthesized? Is it racemic or high d-potency? Why do they finish their manufacture by pressing it into tablets?

Thank you! Hopefully someone can at least point me in the right direction

 

[deficiT]

I am not soliciting advice nor providing advice to manufature illicit substances.

Yaba in East Asia has been around for a while now, how is Yaba synthesized?

I feel like these statements contradict each other.

And the site ultimately doesn't partake in conversations about the hows and whys of the drug trafficking world.

I'll see what the other DC staff say, and if anyone can maybe point you to an off site resource, but otherwise I will likely close this one too.

Regardless of what your purposes are for this information, it's just very much on the line of what we don't get into here, for everyone's safety.

 

[deficiT]

For now I am going to close this. This conversation is basically way too close to synth discussion for my liking and I'll end up having to close it soon enough anyway. If another mod comes forward with a compelling argument as to why this should stay open, I'll consider it, but yeah sorry dude, this type of stuff isn't rly our concern here.

 

[deficiT]

Reopened after some discussion amongst moderators

 

[Methamphetanonymous]

Thank you! I made some weird phone calls, reached out online, and used smarter words for my search engine and got some interesting info! Only posting what I could verify from my notes but I'll add anything else if I can verify it



The Americas



Mexico: Since 2017/2018 haved used a reductive animation but are playing cat and mouse with Federales preprecursor import bans and moved to importing prepreprecursors and starting routes there. Resolved and purified to 90%+D isomer. The Cartels labs are decentralized and independently operated so consistency is variable but quite potent and L isomer generally sub 1%. With nitrostyrene being made and not bought new impurities leftover; N-butylamphetamine in particular have been implicated online to interact with dopamine systems in the brain much like amphetamine and methamphetamine but the molecules size simply blocks these sites, and methamphetamine can't interact. This may cause a dose ceiling and explain widespread anecdotes suggesting this enantiomically pure product is incredibly weaker than in the past.



The Cartel has had meth imports seized by the Canadian government but less than expected. They continue to cater primarily to growing US demand but are very much a global operation with export product seized in Japan, Australia, and all over Europe. Cartel representatives and now even full time small groups of them operate recrystalization labs and distribute themselves. They have been confirmed to have taught Eastern European labs how they resolve the racemic yield of reductive animation into a D and L seperation, as well as how to reracemize the L waste into DL and resolve indefinitely. Reductive animation meth with 90%D and trace L has be found by forensic labs, stemming from the Czech Republic, Germany, and the Netherlands with cartel members even being arrested at various superlab locations. Reports are growing that the Cartel has now expanded to self operated superlabs in European countries



Still finding success in storing the freebase in liquid solvent for border crossing then acid gassing and recrystalizing in smaller more localized labs, liquid meth remains the most seized form of the drug at the US/Mexico boarder. 4/5 cartel smugglers are citizens of the US.



A lot of muddled activity in the lower Americas. With reported increases of various precursor import seizures it would seem production is active in many South and Central American countries but with little understanding of amphetamines government data is slim.



Guatemala appears to be positioned to be a big player, as EU officials have reported several imports of meth seized, traced back to Guatemala. Their most recent precursor seizures were bulk pseudoephedrine powder, indicating at least a large presence of unknown reduction methods.



Canada: Still has a domestic supply more robust than the USA despite harsher precursor laws. yield data and other clues, global officials estimate that using ephedra plant material as an imput increases profitability in Afghanistan. In appears that labs export their highest purity products like crystal meth shards or powders, and crude low potency pills and pastes get sold domestically. There is a large gap between the estimated production of meth in Afghanistan and availability of precursor materials, giving clues that shipments of ephedrine from India and South America to the Middle East fill the gap and account for the highest purity products. A national cold medicine shortage likely related to the shocking spike of meth production from 2019-2024 and neighbor Pakistan banning cold medicine containing precursors, the expectation is that we will see more imported precursors to sustain the rapid growth of Afghanistans mysterious meth industry