The European Commission steps up fight against money laundering and terrorist financing

May 21, 2020

The Commission has published a comprehensive Action Plan on its official website, which sets out concrete measures that the Commission will take over the next 12 months to better enforce, supervise and coordinate the EU’s rules on combating money laundering and terrorist financing.

Main provisions of the new Plan:

Effective application of EU rules: the Action Plan aims to ensure that the European Banking Authority makes full use of its new powers to tackle money laundering and terrorist financing.

A single EU rulebook: in the first quarter of 2021, the Commission will propose a harmonised set of rules that will eliminate the consequences of ambiguous interpretation of existing rules.

EU-level supervision: in the first quarter of 2021, the Commission will propose to set up an EU-level supervisor.

A coordination and support mechanism for Member State Financial Intelligence Units: the Commission will propose to establish an EU mechanism to help further coordinate and support the work of these bodies.

Enforcing EU-level criminal law provisions and information exchange: the Commission will issue guidance on the role of public-private partnerships to clarify and enhance data sharing.

The EU’s global role:  the EU will need to adjust its approach to third countries with deficiencies in their regime regarding anti-money laundering and countering terrorist financing that put our Single Market at risk.

Also, a new methodology for identifying countries with strategic deficiencies in their national anti-money laundering and terrorist financing regimes that pose significant threats to the EU financial system was published.

A list of these countries and more detailed information in the official source:

https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_20_800