BANKING/LEGAL: “Efforts to overhaul U.S. anti-money-laundering laws are gathering steam, as large banks, anticorruption groups and law-enforcement authorities coalesce around the idea of creating a national database of corporations and their true owners…
The financial industry’s support for the plan, which would require new and existing corporations to register with the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, could be pivotal.
The database measure is part of a draft bill backed by Reps. Steve Pearce (R., N.M.) and Blaine Luetkemeyer (R., Mo.). Changes in the U.S. anti-money-laundering regime also are set to be discussed Tuesday during the Senate Banking Committee’s first hearing of the year.
Treasury in 2016 issued a long-awaited rule mandating banks to identify the true owners of companies they take on as clients. It also urged Congress to create a national database of those owners, a step that proponents said would stymie the creation of shell companies by bad actors.
The rule goes into effect in May, giving banks a new incentive to back such a measure.”
-Lalita Clozel, “Banks Seek Government Help to Track Money Laundering,” The Wall Street Journal online, Jan. 9, 2018 05:30am