Chasing dirty money
Authorities warn: Money launderers are acting more and more professionally
Money launderers and terrorist groups now operate almost as professionally as financial companies, says the head of Germany’s anti-money laundering authority FIU. She tries to stop them.
Money launderers are becoming more and more professional and spend large sums of money to launder their money. This is the conclusion drawn by the Central Office for Financial Transaction Investigations (FIU) when presenting the 2023 annual report.
The professional money launderers are getting better and better, said the head of the anti-money laundering authority, Daniel Thelesklaf: “More and more professional, more and more division of labor, more and more diversified.” Money launderers are prepared to pay high prices for the “laundering process”. 20 to 30 percent is a usual margin for a large amount. These values show the great importance that money laundering has for criminal organizations.
Over 322,000 suspicious activity reports
The FIU is a Cologne-based authority where data scientists, lawyers and former investigators investigate suspicious money flows. They want to prevent criminals from laundering money or financing terrorists.
Last year, the FIU received over 322,000 such suspicious activity reports. The authority evaluated them and forwarded 82,000 analysis reports to state criminal investigation offices and public prosecutors. The number of these reports has more than doubled in the past year, it said. The authority attributes this increase to the fact that those required to report are increasingly understanding what exactly is suspicious and needs to be reported. This would result in fewer minor cases being reported.
Hamas and Hezbollah in focus
“Our analysis reports with indications of possible money laundering activities are often a starting point for prosecutors to initiate investigations,” said Thelesklaf. Around 400 analysis reports are sent every day. According to the FIU, the most important overarching goal is to uncover patterns and anomalies in payment flows – and thus find large networks for money laundering and terrorist financing.
In the past year, the work of terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah has come into even greater focus, emphasized Thelesklaf.
dpa
Source: Stern
