FCA held its annual financial crime conference on 10 November. Among the key points noted by FCA speakers were:
- Andrew Bailey, in his opening address, highlighting FCA’s “Mission”, and commenting that reliance on prescriptive regulation is not best suited to the evolving risks of financial crime. He also acknowledged the challenges firms face in complying with what are often global policies;
- Rob Gruppetta, noting the importance of the collaboration in information sharing the Joint Money Laundering Intelligence Taskforce will bring and recognising the significant costs to industry of compliance. He noted FCA’s support for the Government’s “Verify” project for digital CDD. He also warned that FCA is soon to inspect a random sample of around 100 non-high risk firms per year to assess their efforts to tackle financial crime. The end of the first cycle of FCA’s Systematic Anti-Money Laundering Programme has given FCA excellent information and understanding of firm’s aims and achievements – and on what leads to failings in implementation of financial crime prevention ideals; and
- Nausicaa Delfas, focusing on how technology can help firms manage their financial crime risk and Rob Gruppetta leading a panel discussion on the effectiveness of the AML regime in disrupting financial crime.
FCA will need to make changes to the Financial Crime Guide as part of the UK’s implementation of MLD4, and will be consulting on this in due course.