This is a terrific step forward in curbing money laundering and terrorism financing in a region that has seen bad press recently. Some considerations on what to do once information sharing processes begin include:
- Creating and maintaining a centralized database of all persons and entities cleared to conduct business across participating financial institutions (FIs)
- Sharing Customer Identification Program (CIP), customer due diligence (CDD), enhanced due diligence (EDD) information for risk review
- Updating databases with relevant information acquired through suspicious activity reporting, sanctions, criminal records and FI monitoring reports (transactions, updated data), etc.
- Maintaining persons and entity risk ratings based on shared transaction activity
- Investigating and assessing beneficial ownership
- Investigating and assessing correspondent relationships and related risk
- Conducting periodic file reviews and risk assessments every 12 to 36 months (based on risk profiles)
Financial regulators in eight Nordic and Baltic countries have agreed to share more information about money-laundering threats in an effort to fight financial crimes. Regulators said they plan to develop a coordinated process for exchanging information across Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden. A formal agreement among the agencies is being drafted, the regulators said. The measures by Nordic and Baltic regulators comes as banks in the region face questions about safeguards for spotting financial crimes. The questions have had a significant impact, prompting credit ratings firms to cut their outlooks and banks to reshuffle their management. The move is the latest joint effort by financial regulators and banks across the globe to improve their anti-money-laundering compliance.
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