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Beneficial Ownership, Russian Bears and Bitcoins: Looking Ahead at AML in 2015
printIn the messy art of prognostication, everything is overly easy and nothing exact, not even compliance expectations. But one thing government officials and financial industry representatives seem certain of: 2015 will prove just as challenging as the past year for anti-money laundering professionals. While it's been a safe bet in recent years to assume regulatory expectations will only grow, the signs for 2015 are particularly clear. For one, the U.S. Treasury Department is expected to finalize new customer due diligence requirements and the European Union is set to publish its latest anti-money laundering (AML) directive. In a survey of some...
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The leak of millions of records purporting to show widespread exploitation of offshore financial centers by global leaders, lenders and criminals is expected to draw governmental scrutiny of illicit finance, however unevenly.
The year has hardly begun and already some of its biggest challenges for compliance departments seem evident: contending with expected rules on customer due diligence, evolving sanctions obligations and the U.S. Justice Department's emphasis on individual liability.
At its highest levels, Russian corruption over the past 20 years has been disguised by networks of shell companies and facilitated by foreign banks willing to turn a blind eye to state embezzlement, according to Karen Dawisha, a political science professor at Ohio-based Miami University.
This time last December, one might reasonably have expected that 2014 would be a year of modest changes for the anti-money laundering and sanctions compliance sector. Then came JPMorgan Chase, BNP Paribas and a convoy of Russian tanks to quash that notion.
The number of enforcement actions issued annually by the top regulator of large U.S. banks declined in 2013, according to a semiannual report on risk published Wednesday by the agency.
Relative to the year before, the anti-money laundering (AML) compliance industry drew few headlines over the past 12 months, and yet no one would tell you their job got any easier.
Penny stock fraud and soon-to-be introduced customer due diligence regulations should be foremost on the minds of compliance officers at small securities firms, believes Kenneth Cherrier, senior vice president and chief supervisory officer at Overland, KS-based Waddell & Reed, Inc.
Though none can predict the future, one thing in the AML world seems certain: the jobs of compliance officers won't get any easier in 2013.
For many anti-money laundering and sanctions professionals, 2012 will be remembered as a year of record fines. Banks paid billions to settle AML and sanctions compliance violations, with one penalty alone reaching almost $2 billion.
The number of federal anti-money laundering enforcement actions issued in the first half of 2012 fell by 35 percent in comparison to the total levied during the same period last year, data shows.
A planned regulatory overhaul, economic sanctions against Iran and the enforcement of anti-bribery rules will be among the biggest issues British financial institutions contend with in 2012, say experts.
Whether the economy improves or stays flat in 2012, the coming year will pose a number of new challenges for the compliance professionals charged with implementing sanctions and anti-money laundering controls, say industry leaders.
Possible budget cuts for the U.S. financial intelligence unit are spurring concerns that the bureau may curtail its funding of the Internal Revenue Service's anti-money laundering examinations, say current and former federal officials.
We never said compliance professionals had it easy, and 2010 doesn't look to be a year when things will be any better for the anti-money laundering and counterterrorism financing industry.
Bank closings and enforcement actions for capital requirement and credit risk violations didn't preclude law enforcement and regulatory officials from pursuing banks for violating U.S. and international sanctions in 2009 or from leaning on financial institutions to catch tax cheats.