October 2019

International

The global AML/CTF standard-setter, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF):

• Published October 2019 Public Statement which identifies jurisdictions with strategic deficiencies in AML/CFT measures. The FATF remains concerned by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea’s failure to address the significant deficiencies in its AML/CFT regime and the serious threats they pose to the integrity of the international financial system.The FATF also continued to call on its members and urges all jurisdictions to continue to advise their financial institutions to apply enhanced due diligence with respect to business relationships and transactions with natural and legal persons from Iran, and Iran will remain on the FATF Public Statement until the full Action Plan has been completed.
• Updated its On-Going Global AML/CFT Compliance Process for jurisdictions that have strategic AML/CFT deficiencies for which they have developed an action plan with the FATF. Iceland, Mongolia and Zimbabwe have been added to the list as they made a high-level political commitment to work with the FATF to strengthen the effectiveness of their AML/CFT regime in October 2019 and there are works to be done to implement their action plan. Ethiopia, Sri Lanka and Tunisia are no longer subject to the FATF’s monitoring process as they have strengthened the effectiveness of their AML/CFT regimes by addressing technical deficiencies identified by the FATF in 2017. We will incorporate this into our country risk rating update.
• Published its methodology for assessing compliance with the FATF Recommendations and the effectiveness of AML/CFT systems. The assessment focused on two areas, effectiveness and technical compliance.
• Published Best Practices on Beneficial Ownership for Legal Persons which provides guidance to countries on dealing with secrecy of ultimate owners of a company, foundation, association or any other legal person, and prevent their misuse for crime and terrorism. 
• Actively monitoring emerging assets including global “stablecoins”. FATF will continue to examine their characteristics and Money laundering risk, and consider further clarifications on how the FATF standards apply to global “stablecoins” and their service providers, as well as whether further updates are necessary.
• Public consultation - FATF is developing guidance to clarify how digital identity (digital ID) systems can be used for customer due diligence and is consulting private sector stakeholders before finalising the guidance.

Regional

The Asia/Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG):

• Published APG Mutual Evaluation Reports for Chinese Taipei, Pakistan, Solomon Islands and Philippines.
• Published APG Mutual Evaluation Follow-Up Reports for Macao China, Mongolia and Sri Lanka.

Australia

The Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC):

• Released proposed amendments to Chapter 11 of the AML/CTF Rules for public consultation. The proposed amendments remove references to the 2018 reporting and lodgment periods and sets those periods for 2019 and each successive year. The amendments also make minor drafting changes to simplify the expression of the circumstances in which registered remittance affiliates are exempted from the compliance reporting obligations. The consultation period for these amendments is open from 15 October 2019 to 12 November 2019
• Released mutual banking sector money laundering and terrorism financing risk assessment to assist Australia’s financial services industry to identify, understand and disrupt serious criminal activity targeting Australia’s financial system.
• Fintel Alliance, an AUSTRAC initiative, released a report to help industry identify and report on the common indicators of illegal phoenix activity - including customer’s demographic, financial activity, bank account history and company registration.

New Zealand

The Department of Internal Affairs (DIA):

• Issued October 2019 AML/CFT Newsletter:
• General overview brochure available on the Ministry of Justice website to help businesses explaining to their customers why they must provide their identity documents or information about the source of their wealth.
• Webinar available on how to complete a risk assessment for your business which covers:
• What a ML/FT risk assessment is and why you need one;
• Tips for writing your risk assessment;
• What your risk assessment must cover; and
• Methodology for conducting a risk assessment.
• Shared learnings from two high value dealers in the motor vehicle sector about what they did to be regulation ready.
• Compliance action taken against OTT Trading Group Limited, an Auckland-based money remitter, and MSI Group Limited, a Christchurch-based money remitter, under the AML/CFT Act.

The Financial Markets Authority (FMA):

• Published AML/CFT Audit Guideline to help reporting entities understand the AML/CFT audit requirements in terms of the AML/CFT Act 2009, and undertake an effective and credible audit of their risk assessment and AML/CFT programme.
• Issued a formal warning to a non-licensed derivatives issuer and forex provider, Circle Markets Limited that had failed to compliant with their AML/CFT obligations.

Hong Kong 

No major updates this month.

Canada

No major updates this month.

United Kingdom

The Gambling Commission:

• An online gambling operator, Petfre (Gibraltar) Limited, will pay £322,000 for money laundering failures. The investigation revealed the operator failed to carry out adequate source of funds checks on a customer who deposited £210,000, and lost £140,000, of stolen money in a 12-day period in November 2017. The findings indicate that there were weaknesses in its systems relating to how it managed this customer for anti-money laundering.

Singapore

No major updates this month.

United States

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN):

• Imposed the fifth special measure against the Islamic Republic of Iran as a jurisdiction of primary money laundering concern. FinCEN is issuing this final rule, pursuant to Section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act, to prohibit the opening or maintaining of correspondent accounts in the United States for, or on behalf of, Iranian financial institutions, and the use of foreign financial institutions’ correspondent accounts at covered U.S. financial institutions to process transactions involving Iranian financial institutions.

South Africa

The Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC):

• Published advisory on FATF October 2019 Public Statement and On-Going Global AML/CFT Compliance Process.