Bahamas largely compliant with most FATF AML/CFT recommendations

The Bahamas is now compliant with 38 out of 40 Financial Action Task Force (FATF) recommendations to strengthen its anti-money laundering/combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) framework with the Caribbean arm of the regulatory body, noting that this jurisdiction is now “compliant” with 18 recommendations and “largely compliant” on 20 of them.

The recently released 4th Enhanced Follow Up Report and Technical Compliance Re-Rating, noted the progress made in addressing technical compliance deficiencies in the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF) assessment in 2017, which led to a grey listing for The Bahamas that was ultimately removed last year.

“Since the assessment of The Bahamas’ measures against money laundering and terrorist financing, the country has taken significant actions to strengthen its AML/CFT/CFP framework,” the CFATF stated in a release accompanying the report.

“The Bahamas has been under enhanced monitoring since the adoption of its Mutual Evaluation Report. In line with the CFATF Procedures for the Fourth Round of Mutual AML/CFT Evaluations, the country has reported back to the CFATF on the actions it has taken since its mutual evaluation and its 3rd Enhanced Follow-up Report. Consequently, to reflect the progress of The Bahamas, the CFATF has re-rated the country in relation to Recommendations 6, 7, 24 and 33 from partially compliant to largely compliant and Recommendations 19, 22, 26, 27 and 28 from partially compliant to compliant.”

Last year The Bahamas had 30 compliant and largely compliant ratings and ten partially compliant ratings.

Already with these ratings, The Bahamas was firmly on par with the top FATF member states including the United States, Switzerland and Ireland.

While the report addressed the progress made to improve legislative deficiencies, it did not address the progress The Bahamas has made to improve its effectiveness, the CFATF stated.

The regulatory body said a later follow-up assessment will take place to analyze progress on improving effectiveness, which may result in re-ratings of immediate outcomes at that time.

The former Minnis administration made it a priority to keep The Bahamas in good standing with international financial regulators, focusing a great portion of the legislative agenda on introducing and amending laws to make this jurisdiction compliant with the requirements of the European Union (EU), FATF and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), among others.

The post Bahamas largely compliant with most FATF AML/CFT recommendations appeared first on The Nassau Guardian.

source https://thenassauguardian.com/bahamas-largely-compliant-with-most-fatf-aml-cft-recommendations/