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Author Topic: For the first half of 2012:T&T records $500m in suspicious transactions  (Read 1025 times)

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Offline Bourbon

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http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/2012-09-16/tt-records-500m-suspicious-transactions

Trinidad and Tobago is at risk of being blacklisted by the international Financial Action Task Force (FATF) if by 2014 it continues to fail to prosecute anyone under anti-money laundering or combating the financing of terrorism (AML-CFT) laws. So said attorney and Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist David West at a seminar at the Hyatt Regency in Port-of-Spain yesterday. Speaking at the event organised by the Anointed Professionals Exhibiting Excellence (APEX), West said, “Come 2014, somebody is going to have to be charged.”

 

He explained that “in 2010 there were $263 million worth of Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs); in 2011, there were $569 million worth of SARs; that’s $832 million worth of SARs and there have been no prosecutions.” However, the situation is even more alarming for the first half of 2012 where already, $500.47 million of SARs have been reported.

 

Keith King, CEO and chairman of Firstline Securities who also spoke, later compounded West’s figures saying SARs and Suspicious Transaction Reports (STRs) totalled 303 in 2011, up from 111 in 2010. King said SARs and STRs totalled $304.1 million in dollar terms in 2011, up from $85.7 million in 2010.

 

“This represents a 172 per cent increase in the amount of SARs/STRs and a 254.84-per cent increase in dollar terms (or) value of the reports,” King told the audience which included financial advisers, representatives of financial institutions and attorneys.


 

‘T&T not ready for 4th round evaluation’
On one of his powerpoint slides, King showed attendees that at the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), “121 suspicious activity transactions/activity reports were received and disseminated between January and June 2012. Total value of the SARs/STRs for the first half of 2012 is $500.47 million.”

 

He said that “only half of the year has gone by and we have already surpassed 2011,” and later added that very few cases have led to prosecutions or convictions. He cited the only two to the best of his knowledge to be the Piarco airport corruption case and the Vicky Boodram case.

 

 

Speaking after Financial adviser Roger Hernandez of the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF), who was tight-lipped about the results of the 3rd Round of Mutual Evaluation Reports, West said that independently of the results from the 3rd Round, “Trinidad and Tobago is not ready for the 4th Round of Mutual Evaluation Reports.”

 

The evaluation report provides a summary of the AML-CFT measures in place in Trinidad and Tobago, and influences whether the country stays on the grey list, moves to the white list or falls to the black list. There are 12 pieces of legislation dealing with AML-CFT and the country has witnessed “amendment after amendment,” West said. “How do we expect people to catch up and know what to follow?” he asked rhetorically.

 

He said it was his view that T&T needs more suitably qualified people to draft the laws because the current draftspeople “are limited in what they know” and lack the specialised training necessary.
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Offline weary1969

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Re: For the first half of 2012:T&T records $500m in suspicious transactions
« Reply #1 on: September 18, 2012, 07:36:50 AM »
Well we know bout blacklist in these parts so we will b aok with the blacklist.
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Offline Dutty

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Re: For the first half of 2012:T&T records $500m in suspicious transactions
« Reply #2 on: September 18, 2012, 08:11:58 AM »
 :o papa yo...WE REACH!!

half ah billion dollars in drug  money and no OPV to curb it....we go ketch mexico by 2020
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Offline Football supporter

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Re: For the first half of 2012:T&T records $500m in suspicious transactions
« Reply #3 on: September 18, 2012, 08:53:28 AM »
Well, now T&T is at the top of this table, it should be easy for our more talented money launderers to obtain work permits and transfer to the English premier league giants like Barclays or Standard Chartered  :rotfl:

Offline Flex

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Re: For the first half of 2012:T&T records $500m in suspicious transactions
« Reply #4 on: October 20, 2012, 05:01:42 AM »
TT off blacklist
By LARA PICKFORD-GORDON
Newsday
Saturday, October 20 2012


THIS COUNTRY has been removed from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) list of countries with strategic Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Combatting Financing of Terrorism (CFT) deficiencies.

“The FATF has recognised that significant progress has been made,” Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar said yesterday in a statement in the House of Representatives at Tower D, International Waterfront Centre in Port-of-Spain.

Her news came after a plenary meeting of FATF officials in Paris yesterday. The FATF is an international agency which sets standards and promotes effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and other threats to the international financial system.

Persad-Bissessar recalled the “dark and gloomy” picture painted by the Opposition PNM about TT being blacklisted, investors losing confidence and TT becoming a haven for money launderers and terrorists. She said, “right thinking citizens were not misled by the dark and gloomy picture.”

Persad-Bissessar said when the PP took office, the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) was not operational, defective legislative framework and a private practice attorney and consultant to office of the AG was appointed to act as interim director. She said conflict of interest was an issue government had to look at. At the time TT was on the “brink of being blacklisted.”

Persad-Bissessar provided an overview of the progress made to have TT removed from the list of countries with deficiencies after the FATF report of February 2010 identified TT publicly as a country with strategic AML, CFT deficiencies. She said, “the public identification came as a result of a mutual evaluation conducted where TT was rated as partially compliant or non compliant in 15 of 16 core recommendation of FATF.”

Among the actions taken: the appointment of a national AML/CFT Committee comprising senior Cabinet ministers and high level technocrats, a comprehensive overview of legislation and amendments. Persad-Bissessar said five pieces of essential legislation came in 2011 and a sixth this year.

At a meeting with Caribbean FATF officials TT’s progress was discussed. Persad-Bissessar said she reinforced the Government’s commitment to further compliance with international standards set by FATF and in June this year the FATF agreed that TT had made significant progress in rectifying its AML/CFT deficiencies. Persad-Bissessar said FATF conducted an onsite visit August 28-29 to ensure that the progress reported by technocrats at the FATF Plenaries had in fact been made and were sustainable. They met with with senior public and private groups responsible for implementing the AML/CFT regime.

Opposition Leader Dr Keith Rowley yesterday said while he is happy to hear TT was removed from the FATF list he did not think the PM had to interrupt yesterday’s debate proceedings to make this announcement.

“So desperate is the Government for good news to change the national agenda that the Prime Minister stretched this thing out in a most boring and ridiculous statement,” Rowley said.

He said that under the previous PNM administration, interim arrangements were made including the appointment of an interim FIU director. It was “a work in progress.”

Rowley said legislation the PM spoke of were in draft and preparation phase when the People’s Partnership took office. Rowley referred to the FATF report of June this year, which he said, indicated TT had not kept certain commitments.

Rowley said that he thought the PM was going to announce that the FIU had found some, “big fishes”.

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