Illicit Finance

Wildlife traffickers are funneling dirty money through the same financial pipelines used for such illicit activity as human trafficking, child sexual exploitation, and the illegal sale of weapons around the world, according to new University of Waterloo research cited by CBC News. 

Brazil’s central bank unveiled long-awaited rules for virtual assets on Monday, extending anti–money laundering (AML) and counterterrorism financing (CTF) obligations to crypto firms and classifying fiat-pegged crypto transactions as foreign-exchange operations, Reuters reported. 

Albanian organized crime groups have tightened their grip at home and expanded across Europe while drawing minimal pushback from Brussels, according to a Follow the Money investigation conducted with media partner BLAST. 

The U.S. Justice Department is investigating whether Iranian oil tycoon Hossein Shamkhani violated sanctions while using a global network of banks, according to Bloomberg.

ID thieves based in California’s San Fernando Valley and Glendale have been using the Social Security Numbers of foreign scholars who left the U.S. years ago to file hundreds of bank and credit-card applications, according to a cybercrime expert who spoke with the Los Angeles Times.

Australian authorities charged a former National Australia Bank employee they allege acted as the “gatekeeper of funds” for a Sydney crime syndicate accused of defrauding “all financial institutions,” according to a Reuters report.

Belgian authorities have officially charged former European commissioner Didier Reynders with money laundering, a person familiar with the case confirmed to Follow the Money. He is not being held in custody.

The Central Bank of Ireland has fined cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase €21.5 million for failing to properly monitor transactions, including activity potentially linked to child sexual exploitation, drug trafficking, money laundering and other crimes. 

Germany’s financial watchdog BaFin has imposed a record €45-million penalty on JPMorgan Chase for shortcomings in anti-money laundering (AML) controls, the Financial Times reported, citing the supervisory body. 

The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned eight individuals and two entities allegedly tied to laundering illicit proceeds from DPRK cybercrime and overseas IT work.