AML Compliance

In our State of Financial Crime 2023 survey, more than one in three senior compliance professionals cited reputational risk as the factor most likely to drive change within their organization. This was a 6 percentage point rise from the previous year. Indeed, reputational risk was the only factor to see a year-on-year increase.  

Protests across Ottawa and US-Canada border crossings in 2022 brought global awareness to the problem of crowdfunding platforms being used to finance extremist groups. Crowdfunding has also supported terrorist financing (TF) – notably, for Islamic State (IS) operatives in Syria.

In our 2022 survey of global compliance professionals, 45 percent of financial institutions said supply chain risk is the area their organization is most focused on improving. Much of this concern is likely driven by the intersection of complex supply chains with a volatile economic environment.

Our annual global compliance survey doesn’t just look at the anti-money laundering (AML) implications of hot topics like the uncertain global economy and Russia’s war in Ukraine, important though those are. It also takes an extended view, exploring the longer-term trends that shape how compliance professionals go about their work. 

The “Three Lines of Defense” describes how financial institutions should manage and structure their anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing (AML/CTF) risk. Firms can use this framework to mitigate risk management gaps and duplication of unnecessary risk coverage. Part 5 of […]

Risk management activities in financial crime prevention include preventive, detective, and corrective controls. Preventive controls include robust due diligence, recordkeeping, and record retention. Detective controls include reporting suspicious activity to the appropriate authorities. Corrective controls include the eventual dismissal of […]

At the onboarding stage, there may be instances where compliance teams need to go a step beyond identifying and verifying their customers. While not every transaction will be subject to increased scrutiny, it’s important compliance teams have the right risk-based […]

To understand the money laundering and terrorist financing risks financial institutions face, firms must verify their customers’ identities and the account relationship’s intended purpose. Compliance officers the world over know this as the customer due diligence (CDD) process. As a […]

Customer onboarding is any financial institution’s first line of defense when tackling money laundering and financial crime. Before providing access to their services, firms must legally vet new clients for money laundering, terrorist financing, and sanctions evasion. As a result, […]

On November 28, 2022, Europol reported that a “super cartel” of drugs traffickers controlling around one third of Europe’s cocaine trade had been busted in a series of coordinated raids. Codenamed Operation Desert Light, 49 suspects were arrested, including six […]

Customer onboarding is where the rubber hits the road for compliance teams. Where the theory of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing meets the commercial reality of the business. In this 5-part explainer, we’ll outline the kinds of issues you’ll face, how to manage them and how to effectively manage your own role in this critical process.

The first Financial Action Task Force (FATF) plenary under the two-year Singapore Presidency of T. Raja Kumar took place in Paris on October 20-21, 2022.  Discussions centered around: Additions to the blacklist Changes to the grey list Further restrictions placed […]