Compliance
Report Pinpoints Swiss Anti-Money Laundering Loopholes
A report by the Swiss government examining the country's anti-money laundering measures has identified loopholes in its defences. While the evaluation report concluded that Switzerland has an effective and efficient system for combating money laundering and terrorist financing, it did highlight a number of "loopholes in the Swiss defensive strategy measures". The Swiss government is proposing to extend its Money Laundering Act to cover terrorist financing, to introduce the obligation to report if there is a suspicion of money laundering and the creation of new offences for the underlying crime such as counterfeiting of goods, product piracy, insider trading and price manipulation. In June 2003, the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering, an international body set up to combat money laundering, revised its recommendations for the first time since its inception in 1990. The Swiss government report said: "Today, Swiss legislation already broadly conforms with the majority of the new FATF standards. In certain sectors, however, current Swiss legislation on combating money laundering does diverge from the FATF recommendations." The Swiss government has instructed the federal finance department to submit a report considering its new recommendations by mid-2007.