9_Anti-Money Laundering Flashcards
What is the role of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF)?
To standardize how money laundering is defined and tackled globally, making international cooperation easier.
What are the FATF 40 recommendations?
Guidelines to help countries fight money laundering, including laws, regulatory measures, and international cooperation.
What is Customer Due Diligence (CDD) in banking?
A process where banks verify the identity of clients to prevent money laundering.
Explain the term ‘bearer shares’ in offshore banking.
Shares that grant ownership to whoever holds the physical share certificate, enabling anonymous control over companies.
What is the significance of offshore financial centers in money laundering?
They provide secrecy and low transparency, making it easier to hide ownership and launder money.
What are Suspicious Transaction Reports (STRs)?
Reports filed by banks when they detect potentially illicit activity, crucial for law enforcement.
How do legal persons like companies facilitate money laundering?
By disguising the true ownership and control of money through corporate structures.
What challenges do investigators face with trusts in anti-money laundering?
Trusts can have opaque and flexible structures that obscure the true beneficiaries and sources of funds.
What are the Non-Cooperative Countries and Territories (NCCTs) according to FATF?
Regions that do not comply with international efforts to combat money laundering and terrorism financing.
How do international business corporations (IBCs) aid in money laundering?
By being exempt from local business and sometimes taxes, allowing owners to conduct transactions secretly.
What is a Shell Bank?
A bank with no physical presence in the country it is registered, posing high risks for money laundering.
What are nominee services and how do they support money laundering?
Services that provide anonymous directors or shareholders for companies to disguise the real owners.
Describe how money can be laundered using complex international structures.
By creating multiple layers of companies in different jurisdictions, obscuring the trail of money through convoluted transactions.
What role does the Egmont Group play in combating money laundering?
An informal network of Financial Intelligence Units that share information to combat money laundering globally.
Why are international cooperation and MLATs important in anti-money laundering efforts?
They facilitate cross-border legal assistance and information sharing, crucial for tracking and prosecuting international financial crimes.
