Reported by DEBORAH LEHR On February 23, a day before the second anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine and a week after the suspected murder of Alexei Navalny, President Joe Biden imposed over 500 new sanctions targeting “Russia’s war machine”. Unfortunately, this strengthened sanctions regime is undermined by a major oversight: the exemption of the American art […]
Reported by the FACT Coalition On Friday, March 1, a federal district judge in Alabama issued an opinion finding that the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), a landmark U.S. anti money laundering law, is unconstitutional on the grounds that Congress supposedly exceeded certain limits on its powers. The decision was handed down in a challenge brought […]
Reported by Dominic Chopping Swedbank has been cleared of money laundering by Estonian prosecutors, ending a years-long probe into the Swedish bank. Swedbank had been under investigation for governance deficiencies related to anti-money laundering measures in its Baltic subsidiaries after a Swedish TV show reported in 2019 that billions of dollars of potentially illicit funds […]
Reported by Kelly Phillips Erb Months after the Corporate Transparency Act—or CTA—went into effect, a federal court has found it unconstitutional. The ruling resulted from a lawsuit filed by the National Small Business United (also known as the National Small Business Association, or NSBA) and Isaac Winkles. On March 1, 2024, U.S. District Judge Liles C. […]
Reported by Deborah Connor, Mark Edelstein, Thomas Fileti, Marc-Alain Galeazzi, Kaleb Keller, Malka Levitin, and Laura Linda Miller of Morrison & Foerster LLP On February 16, 2024, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) issued a notice of proposed rulemaking, which would require certain real estate professionals to report certain transaction information to FinCEN in connection […]
Reported by Nate Nelson Cybercriminals are laundering stolen funds through ordinary people, thanks to a small ecosystem of user-friendly apps that can turn any mobile user into an unwitting money mule. A new report from Cloud SEK details one such app: “XHelper,” an Android platform that connects scammers with citizens of India, whose job is […]
Reported by Matt Egan, CNN Uncle Sam has quietly deployed a new secret weapon designed to catch bad guys trying to steal from taxpayers: artificial intelligence. Starting around late 2022, the Treasury Department began using enhanced fraud-detection methods powered by AI to spot fraud, CNN has learned. The strategy mirrors what is already being done […]
Reported by SWI swissinfo.ch Switzerland and Panama are to cooperate more closely in the fight against international crime. After the Senate in December, on Tuesday the House of Representatives unanimously gave the go-ahead for a new treaty. For the first time, requests for mutual assistance can be submitted electronically. This is the first time that […]
From strip malls in Houston suburbs to beach houses in Brownsville, Texas is an enormous haven for money launderers. But for a long time, nobody has seemed to be in any hurry to do anything to stop dirty money flowing into the Lone Star State. Could that be changing? For several years, the U.S. Department […]
Reported by Dillon De Shong The British Virgin Islands was deemed to be largely compliant with international laws that govern money laundering, tax evasion and terrorism financing. The Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF) published its Mutual Evaluation Report of the Virgin Islands today where it highlighted the BVI’s efforts to make itself compliant. The […]
Financial Crime News Briefs 