Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1368118
5 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 5 MAY 2021 NEWS FIAU AML reports led to nine prosecutions Cash payments of €10,000 for gold, cars, boats and property no longer possible Continued from Page 1 There were nine prosecutions by the police last year, follow- ing reports passed on by the FI- AU that indicated suspicions of money laundering and tax eva- sion. In 2018, no prosecutions resulted. Remote gaming with most suspicious transactions The report shows that remote gaming companies accounted for almost half of the suspi- cious transaction reports re- ceived by the FIAU last year. The gaming industry flagged 2,485 suspicious transactions, accounting for 48% of all re- ports received by the FIAU. Credit institutions came sec- ond with 1,975 STRs, or 38% of all reports filed with the FIAU. Figures show that the agency received a total of 5,207 STRs last year, a significant 85% in- crease over 2019. Of note are 61 STRs flagged by Virtual Financial Asset Agents, which were only regu- lated at law in 2018. STRs are investigated by the FIAU and any suspicion of money laundering or other fi- nancial crimes is passed on for further investigation to the po- lice. Intelligence reports From more than 3,800 cases closed in 2020, the FIAU dis- seminated more than 4,500 intelligence reports to foreign counterparts, the Tax Com- missioner and the police. The Inland Revenue Department recouped €10 million in taxes from reports forwarded to it by the FIAU. A third of the suspicions flagged last year were related to transaction activity, which could not be explained or was inconsistent with the custom- er's known profile. The two major predicate offences re- sulting from the STRs were tax crimes and fraud. The FIAU received 250 re- quests for cooperation from foreign jurisdictions, while the agency sent 741 requests for cooperation. The majority of requests for cooperation received by the FI- AU came from Germany (23%), Italy (16%) and the UK (4%). The majority of requests for assistance sent by the Maltese FIAU were to Italy (8%), the UK (7%), Germany, the US and Switzerland, each totalling 5%. The report shows that the FIAU sent 4,101 spontaneous intelligence reports to foreign jurisdictions and received 102. Germany emerged as the coun- try which sent and received most such reports. The FIAU has seen its head- count increase substantially amid other reforms that the agency had to undergo after re- ceiving rebuke three years ago as Malta's anti-money launder- ing regime came under inter- national scrutiny. The agency today employs 102 people and these are ex- pected to increase to 158 by the end of the year. It will be moving into its new offices at Trident Park in Mrieħel later this year. The agency has spearhead- ed the introduction of a new electronic system that allows banks to upload on a regular basis all IBAN accounts, in- cluding their beneficial owners to the system. This allows the FIAU to automatically trace all Malta-based accounts of an in- dividual or a company without the need to wait for a response from each and every bank. KURT SANSONE LAUNDERING dirty money through luxury purchases made in cash has become a tad hard- er since cash transactions of €10,000 and higher were made illegal last March. The cash restriction was introduced as part of wide-ranging reforms to combat money laun- dering. And now the Financial Intelligence and Anal- ysis Unit has set the ball rolling to create a new internal team focussed on supervising and en- forcing the new cash restriction. The agency will be able to verify transactions carried out in the areas indicated by the law by analysing money transfers and reconciling sales with income derived from them. The regulations prohibit making and receiving payments amounting to €10,000 or more when purchasing or selling immovable property, an- tiques, jewellery, cars, boats and works of art. Cash is still widely used in the criminal econ- omy because it is easier to break the audit trail, according to the Financial Action Task Force, an international anti-money laundering body. Malta had no such restriction on cash transac- tions and the matter was flagged by the Council of Europe's anti-money laundering committee, Moneyval, in its evaluation. "The new rules will impact sellers and buyers," FIAU director Kenneth Farrugia said, during a briefing for journalists on Tuesday ahead of the release of the agency's annual report for 2020. The FIAU was tasked by government to assist in the drafting of the cash restriction law. Farrugia said the law makes it clear that cash transactions of €10,000 or more cannot be bro- ken down into smaller payments to evade the law. Investment services firms incurred the most penalties for failures flagged in supervisory examinations by the FIAU