Enforcers take the fight to money launderers in UK luxury property: but is it enough?
The fight against money laundering through luxury UK property is intensifying. But real estate players have much more to do in bolstering compliance processes. Law enforcers won a major battle in October, when suspected money launderer Manni Hussain surrendered properties
Antiquities and AML – the BSA finally comes calling in 2021
For decades, dealers and auction houses involved in the sale of art and antiquities have evaded the scrutiny of US regulators. The stringent provisions of the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) did not cover the lucrative art market, worth well
The FinCrime Files: top challenges for financial institutions
2020 saw many challenges for all. For financial institutions (and organisations across various industries tackling financial crime) the rise in cyber crime for financial institutions during a global pandemic became worryingly commonplace. With financial crime and AML processes being front-of-mind
AML challenges for 2021: 6MLD, Brexit and Covid-19
The New Year message on money laundering could hardly have been clearer. Just seven days into 2021, HM Revenue & Customs published its latest list of businesses fined for breaches of money laundering regulations – including a record £23.8m
What is an Effective and Reasonably Designed AML Program?
A Review of Recent and Upcoming BSA/AML Reform It seems financial institutions are inundated these days by headlines and news related to anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT). The U.S. is applying a multi-layered approach to implement
The FinCrime Files – Q&A with Rebecca Schauer Robertson, Atlantic Union Bank
In our first interview of 2021, we caught up with Rebecca “Becky” Schauer Robertson, Senior Vice President, Director Financial Investigations Unit at Atlantic Union Bank. Hi Becky, could you tell us a little about yourself and your current role at
The continued shortfall in combatting trade based money laundering
Some 15 years after the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) published its first landmark report on trade-based money laundering (TBML), new research from the independent inter-governmental body makes sobering reading. Organised crime groups continue to exploit the complexities of
The Fault In Our SARs: The importance of realignment towards actionable intelligence
The principle of a Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) is very simple - the transmission of information, typically from regulated firms, which alerts law enforcement that a certain client or activity is in some way suspicious and may indicate money
How can banks achieve perpetual KYC?
How close is the financial world to achieving perpetual KYC? Recent industry research has emphasised the drastic importance of improving KYC and compliance processes as financial institutions drive towards reducing the cost of a lot of the laborious, repeated,
Webinar: Identifying human trafficking through AML and alternative data
In the latest Arachnys webinar, we welcomed Steve Farrer to join our CEO and co-founder David Buxton to discuss the prevalent issue of human trafficking and how banks can identify this criminal activity using alternative data in AML. As one
Interview with Greg Watson: KYC challenges for corporate banks
Corporate banks face a number of hurdles in conducting KYC. Complex processes that involve many parties, causing inefficiencies in operations, are often handled manually and only add to significant costs. When both the onboarding process and periodic review cycles