Information Sharing

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Mexico City’s downtown and Palacio de Bellas Artes building at twilight

Last week, the Financial Action Task Force (“FATF”) issued a report concluding that Mexico needs to “step up efforts in pursuing money launderers.” The report, which summarized the FATF’s findings from its on-site assessment in early 2017, identified three particularly weak areas in Mexico’s AML regime:  preventative measures; investigation and prosecution; and confiscation.  This post summarizes the report’s findings, and observes that Mexico is not the only nation needing to “step up” its efforts.  Further, given the strong financial and geographic ties between Mexico and the U.S., the AML challenges of Mexico can be the challenges of the U.S.…
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FinCEN recently announced the launching of the “FinCEN Exchange” to enhance information sharing with financial institutions.  We previously have blogged about the potential benefits of a public-private partnership between law enforcement and financial institutions for both parties as a way to enhance law enforcement’s efforts to disrupt and intercept money laundering and terrorist financing as well as a financial institution’s ability to identify and accurately report suspicious activity. Information sharing has become a key issue in global conversations about reform of Anti-Money Laundering (“AML”) regimes.

The FinCEN Exchange represents a direct response to financial industry requests for more guidance and information from government to help identify and report suspicious activity. Although it is a positive step towards improving the system for reporting suspicious activity, the FinCEN Exchange presumably will create expectations by the government that problems identified by the Exchange will be captured by suspicious activity reporting going forward.  Hopefully, the converse also will occur, and expectations regarding the reporting of activity identified as low priority will be lowered, so that industry truly may focus its current resources and not be compelled to expend even more resources on AML compliance.…
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PANA Issues Recommendations to European Parliament: Tougher Enforcement, Greater Transparency, Improved Information Sharing and Prohibitions Against Outsourcing of Customer Due Diligence

In the wake of the Panama Papers, the European Parliament (“EP”) formed PANA, a Committee of Inquiry into Money Laundering, Tax Avoidance, and Tax Evasion. We previously wrote about PANA in May when it was examining the role of lawyers in money laundering and tax evasion schemes. After opening their October 19 meeting with a moment of silence to honor the life of Maltese investigative journalist Daphne Coruana Galizia, who recently was killed by a car bomb, PANA approved a draft report and recommendations for review by the EP. The findings and recommendations range from reporting standardization to outsourcing to illicit real estate transactions to attorney-client privilege.

European parliament in Brussels, Belgium.

A few themes emerged from the PANA report:

  • the European Union (“EU”) has strong law, but lacks vigorous enforcement;
  • the EU’s many regulators are stymied by a severe lack of communication, both within nations and between countries;
  • beneficial owners (“BOs”) are mostly unknown because regulated entities are not fulfilling their reporting obligations and the BO register is not robust, accessible, or standardized;
  • intermediaries, like banks, lawyers, accountants, wealth managers, and other financial institutions, are not living up to their obligations because they are engaging in “creative compliance” and leaving compliance responsibility to third parties.

Based on these findings, PANA recommends:

  • uniform definitions and punishments for money laundering and tax-related infractions,
  • “automatic exchange of information,” reciprocity, and “Common Reporting Standards” between regulators to facilitate better information sharing,
  • the creation of a “publically accessible,” standardized BO register that includes the ultimate beneficial owner (“UBO”),
  • the EP pass legislation to “make it illegal to outsource [customer due diligence (“CDD”)] procedures to third parties,”
  • adoption of stronger forfeiture laws that allow cross-border confiscation of illegally obtained assets,
  • stronger sanctions against banks and other intermediaries that “are knowingly, willfully, and systematically implicated in illegal tax schemes,”
  • lawyers should no longer be able to hide behind the attorney-client privilege to escape reporting requirements, like suspicious transaction reports (“STRs”),
  • countries devote more resources to fighting money laundering and tax evasion,
  • the EP vest more oversight powers in PANA.

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Third in a Three-Part Series of Blog Posts

Many Keys to AML Information Sharing This blog focuses on suggested improvements to information sharing between financial institutions, and between financial institutions and governments, to better combat money laundering and terrorist financing. As we recently blogged, the Royal United Services Institute (“RUSI”) for Defence and Security Studies — a U.K. think tank – has released a study:  The Role of Financial Information-Sharing Partnerships in the Disruption of Crime (the “Study”).  The Study focuses on international efforts — including efforts by the United States — in reporting suspicious transactions revealing criminal activity such as money laundering and terrorist financing.  The Study critiques current approaches to Anti-Money Laundering (“AML”) reporting and suggests improvements, primarily in the form of enhanced information sharing among financial institutions and governments. In our first blog post in this series, we described some of the criticisms set forth by the Study regarding the general effectiveness of current suspicious activity reporting.  These critiques related to an ever-increasing amount of SAR filings, coupled in part with a lack a feedback by governments to the filing institutions regarding what sort of information was considered by law enforcement to be actually useful.  In our second post, we discussed the current landscape of AML information sharing in the United States, which is governed by Section 314 of the Patriot Act, and is an important component of many financial institutions’ ability to fulfill successfully their AML obligations.  This third and final blog post pertaining to the Study examines its findings and proposals for developing effective public–private financial information sharing partnerships (“FISPs”) in order to better detect, prevent, and combat money laundering and terrorist financing.  Observing that modern financial crime “operates in real time, is most often international in scale and can be highly sophisticated ad adaptive to avoid detection,” the Study generally posits that AML systems ideally should include real-time and cross-border information sharing.…
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Second in a Three-Part Series of Blog Posts

As we recently blogged, the Royal United Services Institute (“RUSI”) for Defence and Security Studies — a U.K. think tank – has released a study:  The Role of Financial Information-Sharing Partnerships in the Disruption of Crime (the “Study”).  The Study focuses on international efforts — including efforts by the United States — regarding the reporting of suspicious transactions revealing criminal activity such as money laundering and terrorist financing.  The Study critiques current approaches to Anti-Money Laundering (“AML”) reporting, and suggests improvements, primarily in the form of enhanced information sharing among financial institutions and governments.

In our first blog post in this series, we described some of the criticisms set forth by the Study regarding the general effectiveness of suspicious activity reporting, which the Study described as often presenting little or no “operational value to active law enforcement investigations.” In this second blog post pertaining to the Study, we will discuss the current landscape of AML information sharing in the United States — which is governed by Section 314 of the Patriot Act, and which is an important component of many financial institutions’ ability to fulfill successfully their AML obligations. In the third and final blog post pertaining to the Study, we will circle back to the Study and examine its findings and proposals for an enhanced process of information sharing by financial institutions and governments in order to better fight money laundering and terrorism.…
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Despite the staggering $8 billion figure estimated to be spent on global compliance in 2017, U.S.-based rules regarding Anti-Money Laundering (“AML”) and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (“CFT”) remain anchored in their 1970s design. Contrary to the generally slow pace of Congressional action, new technologies may reshape the global financial system (“GFS”) and with it, the ability to detect and disrupt money laundering schemes and terrorist plots. Chief among these is blockchain, a peer-to-peer technology first implemented as the backbone of the virtual currency Bitcoin.…
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The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) highlighted in its December 2016 Mutual Evaluation Report on the United States’ Measures to Combat Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing the “excellent results” in compliance and supervision in the U.S. gaming industry during the period of 2007 to 2016. The report noted that efforts by regulators and the gaming industry have led to enhanced AML and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) compliance. The assessors specifically mentioned the efforts of the American Gaming Association (AGA), including its study, Investing in America’s Financial Security: Casinos’ Commitment to AML Compliance. The FATF report also included several recommended actions related to gaming.
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