Publication of the European legislative package for the creation of the new European authority AMLA, the Regulation, and the 6th Directive on AML/CFT
Publication of the European legislative package for the creation of the new European authority AMLA, the Regulation and the 6th Directive on AML/CFT
On June 19, 2024, the new rules that will protect EU citizens and the EU’s financial system against money laundering and the terrorist financing of terrorism were published in the Official Journal of the European Union.
The regulation harmonises anti-money laundering rules throughout the EU, closing loopholes for fraudsters. It extends the anti-money laundering rules to new obliged subjects, such as most of the crypto-sector, traders of luxury goods and football clubs and agents. The regulation also sets tighter due diligence requirements, regulates beneficial ownership and sets a limit of € 10.000 to cash payments, among other novelties.
The package sets up a new European Authority for Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AMLA) that will have direct and indirect supervisory powers over high-risk obliged subjects in the financial sector. Given the cross-border nature of financial crime, the new authority will boost the efficiency of the AML/CFT framework by creating an integrated mechanism with national supervisors to ensure obliged subjects comply with AML/CFT-related obligations in the financial sector. AMLA will also have a supporting role with respect to the non-financial sector, and coordinate and support financial intelligence units (FIUs – the national bodies which collect information on suspicious or unusual financial activity in member states). In addition to supervisory powers and in order to ensure compliance, in cases of serious, systematic or repeated breaches of directly applicable requirements, the Authority will impose pecuniary sanctions on the selected obliged subjects.
The 6th Directive will improve the organisation of national anti-money laundering systems setting out clear rules on how FIUs and supervisors work together. The new anti-money laundering directive also prescribes that EU member states make information from centralised bank account registers available through a single access point. As the AML directive will provide access to the single access point only to FIUs, it has been approved the Directive 2024/1654 to ensure that the national law enforcement authorities will have access to these registers via the single access point. This directive also includes the harmonisation of bank statement format. Such direct access and use of harmonised formats by the banks is an important instrument in fighting criminal offences and in efforts to trace and confiscate the proceeds of crime.
The full content of the new regulations can be consulted at the following links in English:
- Regulation (EU) 2024/1620 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 31 May 2024 establishing the Authority for Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism and amending Regulations (EU) No 1093/2010, (EU) No 1094/2010 and (EU) No 1095/2010 Text with EEA relevance.
- Regulation (EU) 2024/1624 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 31 May 2024 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing Text with EEA relevance..
- Directive (EU) 2024/1640 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 31 May 2024 on the mechanisms to be put in place by Member States for the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing, amending Directive(EU) 2019/1937, and amending and repealing Directive (EU) 2015/849 Text with EEA relevance.
