"Dutch authorities are increasingly using financial intelligence supplied by banks and other financial institutions to clamp down on trade-based money laundering...
The other investigation, into the vegetable traders, resulted from unusual transaction reports filed by accountants and banks to the FIU [financial intelligence unit] that were passed on to us. The amount of [suspicious] money involved here is €150 million from 2014 to 2019, and while these are a few major players in the sector, these are considerable sums of money.
Beginning next month, the four largest banks in the Netherlands will receive intelligence on suspects as part of a new partnership, the Serious Crime Task Force."
Recent weeks have seen Dutch national police and agents with the Fiscal Intelligence and Investigation Service, or FIOD, raid used car dealerships and agricultural export companies amid concerns that criminals are laundering vast sums of cash under the guise of legitimate commerce. Bert Langerak, FIOD’s chief of criminal investigations, told moneylaundering.com reporter Koos Couvée that new data-sharing platforms and other partnerships between the Dutch government and financial services industry will help identify trade-based laundering schemes as well as unscrupulous attorneys, accountants and other professionals who enable illicit finance.
