Anti-Money Laundering 2023: Risks, Due Diligence and Compliance in an Evolving Legal World

The PLI Anti-Money Laundering Conference—held live and virtually this year—will tackle critical issues in Anti-Money Laundering (AML)/Counter-Financing of Terrorism (CFT) compliance, AML regulations, and money laundering enforcement.

Peter Hardy, Co-Leader of our AML Team, will chair the event and moderate two of the panels. The three panels will be:

Recent Trends in Money Laundering and BSA Enforcement

The Department of Justice continues to bring major money laundering indictments and civil forfeiture actions. The panel will discuss:

• Enforcement actions against individuals: key cases and emerging trends.
• Enforcement actions against organizations: key cases and emerging trends.
• The implications for U.S. financial institutions and their AML programs, including risks and the red flags for potentially problematic customers and business lines.

Digital Assets and AML: Evolving Regulations and Enforcement

One of blockchain’s most compelling and adopted use cases is to make the cross-border movement of money faster, cheaper, and decentralized. The panel will discuss:

• The (near) future of crypto: what is the likely regulatory landscape going forward?
• What do regulators expect a recipient to know about the source of digital asset funds? (Travel rule, mixers/tumblers, hosted vs. unhosted wallets);
• Transaction tracing and investigations of illicit crypto schemes: illicit funds, hacking, ransomware, and more. How can crypto transactions be traced, and “bad guys” be identified – from the perspective of scheme victims, government investigators, and financial institutions?

Regulatory Priorities: Beneficial Ownership, Effective AML Programs, National Priorities, and More

The historic AML Act and Corporate Transparency Act (“CTA”) expand the goals of the Bank Secrecy Act and continue to generate new regulations, government reports and implementation issues. Topics discussed by the panel will include:

• FinCEN has announced its national AML priorities. How can they be acted upon in a meaningful way?
• The BSA now requires by statute “effective” AML programs to be “risk based.” What does that mean, in practice?
• The AML Act seeks to maximize effective BSA reporting, such as SARs and CTRs, in part through enhanced information sharing between government and industry. Is progress occurring, and how might that goal be best realized?
• The CTA requires beneficial ownership reporting by businesses upon incorporation. Do the implementing regulations appear to be effective? What is the impact of the CTA on existing customer due diligence requirements for financial institutions?

Click here for more information and to register.