The Treasury Committee has launched a new inquiry to look at what progress has been made in combatting economic crime, building on previous recent inquiries, It will focus on:
- AML systems and the sanctions regime, including the FinCEN papers the the work of OPBAS, corporate liability for economic crime and the work of Companies House; and
- consumers, including trends that have emerged from the pandemic and APP fraud. A separate committee is already looking into economic crime related to the BBLS;
The deadline for submitting evidence is 27 November.
FCA has written to Mel Stride, setting out what it has been doing in response to the FinCEN papers, and, generally on its AML powers. It has written to all authorised firms identified in the press coverage that have a UK presence, asking them for more information, and is considering whether any immediate supervisory mitigation steps are needed. If it needs to, it will consider enforcement investigations – which would need to include considering whether firms’ systems and controls have improved or been remediated in the time since the alleged failings occurred. It noted that, generally, it has a number of ongoing investigations into suspected civil and criminal breaches of AML requirements.