Category: Money Laundering

The European Union has signed the Additional Protocol to the Council of Europe’s Warsaw Convention on money laundering, confiscation and terrorist financing, on 14 October 2026, the day it opened for signature in Strasbourg. The Council of the EU authorised the signature by decision the previous day. The Protocol modernises the international framework for tracing, freezing, managing and confiscating criminal assets. Each party must establish or designate an asset recovery office, and asset recovery and asset management offices will be required to cooperate directly and within set deadlines. It also widens information sharing, allows joint investigation teams, regulates asset-sharing between…

The Star Entertainment Group has said it will accept the A$260 million (about US$183.6 million) penalty imposed by Australia’s Federal Court for breaches of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing laws, ending civil proceedings brought by AUSTRAC in 2022. Justice Cameron Moore ordered A$195 million against The Star Sydney and A$65 million against its Queensland operations, payable in four instalments over 19 months. AUSTRAC had sought A$400 million and Star had argued for A$100 million. The court found that between 2016 and 2022 the casinos operated without a compliant AML/CTF programme and failed to monitor customers adequately, allowing more than 1,200…

FinTech Global reports on new analysis from Napier AI arguing that the debate in anti-money laundering has moved on from whether AI belongs in financial crime compliance to how it can be governed and explained. According to Napier AI’s Dr Janet Bastiman, whoever sets the first credible framework for explainable AI in AML will in effect give the rest of the world its template. The analysis groups jurisdictions by regulatory posture. The US, EU and Singapore are described as enthusiastic but working through fragmented rules or AI legislation not written with AML in mind. Australia, Canada and the UAE are…

UK financial firms shut 238,396 accounts suspected of being used by money mules during 2025, according to survey data released by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). The total has risen every year, from 184,935 closures in 2023 and 233,269 in 2024. The regulator cautions that part of the increase may reflect growing customer numbers and better detection, but says the figures still show how deeply mule activity is embedded in the banking system. Customers aged 26 to 39 accounted for the largest share of closures at 91,073, with those aged 25 and under close behind at 85,425. The fastest growth…

The UK government has presented its Anti-Money Laundering and Asset Recovery Strategy 2026-2029 as a turning point in the fight against illicit finance. Published on 15 September, the 101-page strategy carries a foreword from security minister Dan Jarvis and economic secretary to the Treasury Lucy Rigby, who say they want the UK to be a hostile environment for dirty money. The National Crime Agency (NCA) puts the amount laundered through the UK or UK corporate structures at more than £100bn a year. At least £550m backs the plan: £520m from the Economic Crime Levy paid by firms supervised under the…

Five hundred new officers to be recruited in a £500 million crackdown on money laundering, as part of the government’s Anti-Money Laundering and Asset Recovery Strategy. Hundreds of new officers will be recruited to track dirty money, disrupt organised crime networks and seize criminal assets under a major new crackdown. New officers will be deployed across police forces, the NCA and the CPS to follow the money behind serious and organised crime, including through Russian and other international money laundering networks. The new investigators will focus on going after the kingpins behind Britain’s dirty money trade. By blocking and seizing…

Veronica Stratford-Tuke, a Research Fellow in the Centre for Finance and Security at RUSI, has given a qualified welcome to the UK government’s Anti-Money Laundering and Asset Recovery Strategy for 2026 to 2029. She notes the National Crime Agency’s long-standing estimate that more than £100 billion is laundered through or within the UK every year, activity she ties to organised criminals, sanctions evaders and hostile states. She is positive about the strategy’s ambition for law enforcement and the private sector to concentrate together on the most harmful laundering and move away from box-ticking. Her warning is that stronger policy on…

Research by academics at Cardiff University and the University of the West of England (UWE) has found that most people arrested for money laundering in England and Wales are under 30. Freedom of Information responses from 36 police forces show 8,956 adults under 30 were arrested for offences under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 between January 2020 and January 2025, out of 14,493 recorded arrests across all ages. Those arrests led to 7,735 charges. Offending is most common among 18 to 29 year olds, and Ministry of Justice figures for the same period show 108 children and 420 young…

AUSTRAC, Australia’s financial intelligence agency and anti-money laundering regulator, has opened an investigation into Western Union Financial Services Australia and its US-based parent company. The inquiry concerns how the companies manage money laundering and terrorism financing risk, covering their anti-money laundering programme, transaction monitoring and governance. It will also test whether their systems can detect known laundering methods and suspicious transactions linked to child sexual exploitation and terrorism financing. The investigation follows earlier engagement with the regulator and an external audit ordered in 2025. Western Union runs one of the world’s largest international money transfer networks, including cash-based cross-border payments,…

ABN AMRO has taken note of the decision by De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB) to impose an administrative fine of EUR 8.5 million in relation to structural shortcomings in the execution of due diligence for a part of its high-risk customers. DNB identified structural shortcomings in a number of files investigated for the period from 20 September 2023 to 9 September 2024. Since the shortcomings were identified by DNB, ABN AMRO has taken further concrete remediation measures to strengthen the effectiveness of its AML processes. ABN AMRO acknowledges the seriousness of the shortcomings identified by DNB and the factual findings in…

French and Italian authorities have continued to work together on an investigation into a money laundering network that uses gold bars to launder drug trafficking profits. Following an initial operation in which EUR 30 million was seized, criminal assets worth EUR 1 million were seized under the coordination of Eurojust and Europol, together with Kosovar authorities. The international criminal network had set up a sophisticated money laundering scheme whereby the illicit proceeds generated from drug trafficking in France were collected at a residence in Italy and converted into gold bars and gold sheets. This made it possible to hide the…

Two men who played key roles in a major international money laundering network have been sentenced following a City of London Police investigation into large‑scale international money laundering, facilitated via the “Encrochat” encrypted messaging network. During the investigation, the Serious Organised Crime Team, a joint City of London Police and National Crime Agency partnership, seized over £2.5m in cash and gold. The pair were convicted for their involvement in laundering over fourteen million pounds linked to serious and organised crime groups operating across the UK and overseas. Ali Raza, 43, of Winston Way, Ilford was sentenced to six years in…

Four men who laundered £23.4 million of dirty cash into cryptocurrency have been jailed for a total of 27 years. Michael Konnor, 27 and Shiraz Khan, 47, controlled a money laundering gang that cleaned cash for organised crime groups between January 2018 and June 2020. John Geddes, 76 and Carlos Zapata, 58 moved the cash and provided key links to Irish and Kurdish criminal groups, who utilised the services of Michael Konnor and Shiraz Khan to launder money. Following an investigation by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) the men were charged and prosecuted with money laundering by specialist prosecutors in…

Egyptian authorities have detained the prominent businessman Sabri Nakhnoukh and frozen his assets, accusing him of leading an organized crime syndicate involved in money laundering, theft, and illegal weapons possession. Prosecutors allege the group used a private security firm as a front for its operations. The arrests, which include Nakhnoukh’s brother and several co-defendants, stem from an investigation triggered by a violent brawl at a Cairo car dealership last week. Nakhnoukh, 63, has long been a polarizing figure in Egypt. Historically known for collaborating with state security to suppress protests under former President Hosni Mubarak, he was sentenced to life…

At least £325bn worth of dirty money is flowing through the UK every year, according to research that is causing concern about funding for state investigators and the government’s push into crypto assets. The figure is equivalent to more than 10% of UK GDP and includes illicit funds linked to financial crime, money laundering, corruption, illegal trade and tax dodging, according to the report by the Finance Innovation Lab charity. Including the UK’s crown dependencies and overseas territories, such as Jersey and the Cayman Islands, the figure jumps to more than £788bn annually. The research is believed to be the…

European football is heading toward one of its most significant regulatory shifts in decades, as the European Union prepares to bring professional clubs and agents into its anti-money laundering framework by July 2029. The move, driven by a sweeping reform package adopted in 2024, reflects growing concern among policymakers that the sport’s global scale, financial complexity, and opaque ownership structures make it vulnerable to illicit financial activity. In an interview with Calcio e Finanza, Bruna Szego, chair of the newly established Anti-Money Laundering Authority, outlined how the EU intends to reshape oversight of the football sector and what clubs must…

A French court has rejected Tunisia’s request to extradite the sanctioned daughter of late President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali over alleged financial crimes, the Paris Court of Appeal confirmed to OCCRP Thursday. Tunisian authorities accuse Halima Ben Ali, the youngest daughter of the late dictator, of several financial crimes. The charges include laundering funds allegedly acquired while her father held power from 1987 to 2011. “The investigating chamber of the Paris Court of Appeal issued a ruling on April 1, 2026, rejecting the extradition request from the Tunisian authorities for Halima Ben Ali, and lifted the judicial supervision to…

Star’s former top boss and its legal counsel both breached their director’s duties during the casino’s scandalous Chinese money laundering era, the Federal Court has found. In a seething judgement, Justice Michael Lee found only partly in favour of the corporate regulator ASIC, which bought the case against a group of Star executives and directors in 2022. ASIC’s case was filed after news of the explosive money laundering scandal broke at Australia’s second biggest casino. The culture of senior management was “dysfunctional” and “unethical”, Justice Lee noted in his remarks. He added that it fell to investigative journalism and a…

Following investigations into a criminal group suspected of laundering at least EUR 306 million of illicit profits from drug trafficking and other crimes, 13 people have been arrested in France and Romania. Investigations coordinated through a joint investigation team at Eurojust revealed that the group had been operating in France and Romania between 2018 and 2024. Consisting of dozens of members operating from Romania and France, the criminal group is suspected of having laundered illicit profits from crimes such as drug trafficking. They set up a sophisticated international operation involving multiple legal entities in France, which they took over and…

Eight African countries are under ‘increased monitoring’ by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), known as the grey list.Grey listing does not impose sanctions but signals to global financial institutions that enhanced scrutiny is required.Each grey-listed country, including Algeria, Angola, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, DRC, Kenya, Namibia, and South Sudan, is undertaking specific reforms to strengthen regulatory frameworks.For emerging African economies, exiting the grey list is seen as a significant milestone signaling stronger regulation. When it places a country under increased monitoring, it means the jurisdiction has identified strategic weaknesses in its financial crime prevention systems and has formally committed to…

The Council of Europe’s anti-money laundering body, MONEYVAL, has published a report urging Guernsey to improve the investigation, prosecution and conviction of money laundering offences whilst also highlighting Guernsey’s good understanding of the risks of money laundering/terrorist financing and its highly effective application of targeted financial sanctions. The report commended Guernsey’s Financial Intelligence Unit for producing high-quality analytical products and strategic analysis, while acknowledging the limited extent to which they are used by law enforcement authorities to initiate investigations. The quality of suspicious activity reports also remains a concern. Guernsey is expected to report back to MONEYVAL, under MONEYVAL’s regular…

For years, investigative journalists have salivated over that old heuristic “follow the money”. Deep Throat’s instruction to Robert Redford’s Bob Woodward in All the President’s Men, delivered in a shadowy car park, has become the North Star for uncovering financial crime and corruption. In his alarming new book, Everybody Loves Our Dollars, Oliver Bullough makes a compelling case that we’ve been looking in the wrong direction. To truly understand the global money-laundering industry, he argues, you need to think a lot bigger. Criminals today have sophisticated ways of making money disappear, “like a wizard in the Harry Potter books” –…

Key Takeaways Freezing Criminal Funds, Faster: KoFIU wants the authority to freeze accounts tied to serious livelihood crimes without waiting for court orders, aiming to cut off criminal proceeds before they disappear.Cross-Border Crime Moves to Center Stage: International criminal groups would be added to prohibited transaction lists, alongside deeper coordination with foreign counterparts and FATF-led initiatives.Crypto Oversight Tightens Again: The travel rule would extend to lower-value transactions, with closer scrutiny of transfers involving personal wallets and overseas exchanges.AML Accountability Shifts Upward: Financial institutions would need to place clear AML responsibility on a senior executive, backed by mandatory evaluations and clearer…

Nepal’s Supreme Court has ordered the government to explain its decision to withdraw money laundering and organized crime charges against Rabi Lamichhane, the country’s former Home Minister. On Tuesday, a single bench of Justice Abdul Aziz Musalman issued a “show cause” order, granting the Attorney General’s Office 15 days to provide a written justification for dropping the high-profile charges. The court also directed Lamichhane to submit a response, either in person or through a legal representative. “The Attorney General’s Office has been ordered to send a response to the writ petition filed within 15 days,” Nirajan Pandey, the Supreme Court’s…

The Korea Financial Intelligence Unit (Korea Financial Intelligence Unit) recently held the first meeting of a new taskforce tasked with revisiting the Act on Reporting and Using Specified Financial Transaction Information. While the meeting itself was procedural, the mandate behind it is anything but. The taskforce is meant to modernize Korea’s AML framework, sharpen responses to cross-border crime and large-scale financial fraud, and prepare the ground for South Korea’s next mutual evaluation by the Financial Action Task Force in 2028. Officials used the kickoff session to take stock. Taskforce members reviewed which parts of the existing regime no longer reflect…