Money Laundering Bulletin

Of 512 law firms inspected in 2023/24 (April to April), 110 (23%) were fully compliant with the UK Money Laundering Regulations (MLRs), the Solicitors Regulation Authority says in its latest AML annual report.

The mechanism by which confiscated criminal assets are recycled into further UK law enforcement efforts to combat economic crime is opaque and creates perverse incentives, according to research by the campaign group Spotlight on Corruption, published on 4 November.

A logic error in the code underpinning Metro Bank's automated transaction monitoring has cost it a UK£16,675,200 (US$21,277,972) penalty from the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

If the problem isn't defined, it can't be solved: so with risk - if not specified and assessed it cannot be controlled. The risk-based approach (RBA) - a staple of anti-money laundering literature and standards for nearly two decades - positively insists on proper assessment if limited compliance resource is to be targeted effectively, and yet... organisations struggle to comply, but then it is only this year that the USA has made the RBA a regulatory obligation. Keith Nuthall explores a fundamental, persistent challenge and how technology providers are rising to it.

Mule accounts lie dormant or are used legitimately for eight months, on average, before activated for money laundering, based on the experience of three UK high street banks.

American Life Insurance Company (ALICO), part of MetLife, Inc., has settled with the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) over apparent violation of US sanctions on Iran; it will pay a civil penalty of US$178,421.

Six law firms have paid fines for core anti-money laundering breaches, according to a spate of enforcement notices published on the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) website between 12 and 15 November.

Artificial intelligence (AI) says, "I detected a criminal!" The criminal says, "I trained you to say that." Welcome to the new reality, says Mayank Sharma of FinScan, where criminals are magicians using AI tricks to make your money go away, and if you don't have tools that are more sophisticated, the only thing left is an expensive lesson.