Outcomes FATF Plenary, 23-25 October 2024

Jurisdictions under increased monitoring  are actively working with the FATF to address the strategic deficiencies in their regimes to counter money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation financing. When the FATF places a jurisdiction under increased monitoring, it means the country has committed to implement an Action Plan to resolve swiftly the identified strategic deficiencies within agreed timeframes. 

At this Plenary, the FATF added Algeria, Angola, Côte d’Ivoire and Lebanon to the list of jurisdictions subject to increased monitoring.

The FATF Plenary congratulated Senegal for its significant progress in addressing the strategic anti-money laundering, countering financing of terrorism and countering financing of proliferation (AML/CFT/CPF) deficiencies previously identified during its mutual evaluation. Senegal has completed its Action Plans to resolve the identified strategic deficiencies within agreed timeframes and will no longer be subject to the FATF’s increased monitoring process. 

Senegal will continue to work with the FATF and the Inter Governmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA) of which it is a member to continue strengthening its AML/CFT/CPF regimes.

The FATF identifies countries or jurisdictions with serious strategic deficiencies to counter money laundering, terrorist financing, and proliferation financing. These jurisdictions are subject to a call for action to protect the international financial system. 

The FATF discussed and approved the joint FATF-GAFILAT mutual evaluation report of Argentina which assessed the effectiveness of the country’s measures to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation financing, and their compliance with the FATF Recommendations. The Plenary concluded that Argentina has improved its AML/CFT/CPF framework since its last mutual evaluation in 2010 and demonstrates strengths in domestic cooperation and coordination between agencies. However, Argentina needs to improve effectiveness across its AML/CFT/CPF system, particularly on targeted financial sanctions related to proliferation financing. Argentina also needs to better understand the money laundering and terrorist financing risks it faces, in particular laundering from corruption and through informal financial services, and to increase the prosecutions of these crimes in line with its risk profile. Argentina should also strengthen the supervision and regulation for some sectors.  

The Plenary also discussed and approved the FATF-MENAFATF assessment of Oman and concluded that Oman has significantly improved its AML/CFT/CPF framework in recent years with robust technical compliance. Oman has taken positive steps regarding the use of financial intelligence, international cooperation combating terrorist financing and implementing targeted financial sanctions for proliferation financing. However, Oman should increase its efforts to achieve greater effectiveness over time, including deepening the understanding of its ML risks, enhancing ML investigations and prosecutions in line with risks and improving confiscation of proceeds of crime. It should also take measures to prevent legal persons from being used for criminal purposes and strengthen risk-based supervision.

The FATF will publish both reports after the FATF’s quality and consistency review is completed.

The suspension of the membership of the Russian Federation continues to stand. Following the statements issued since March 2022, the FATF reiterates that all jurisdictions should be vigilant to current and emerging risks from the circumvention of measures taken against the Russian Federation in order to protect the international financial system.

The risk-based approach is at the core of the FATF Recommendations and effective measures to tackle the trillions of dollars of financial flows that fuel crime and terror. A risk assessment is key to a country being able to identify, assess, and understand the risks it faces so that it can direct its resources where it makes the greatest impact.  

The FATF has revised its guidance for a national money laundering risk assessment to reflect experiences and lessons it has learnt since 2013, when the guidance was first issued. The guidance will help countries, and in particular low-capacity countries, understand and mitigate their illicit finance risks. The guidance benefits from the experience of over 90 countries across the FATF Global Network facing different risks, challenges and at various levels of capacity.

At this Plenary, members agreed to release for public consultation proposed revisions to the FATF Standards (mainly Recommendation 1 on assessing risk and applying a risk-based approach) to support financial inclusion.  

This work was carried out as a result of the FATF Stocktake report on mitigating the Unintended Consequences of the FATF Standards, which concluded that the flexibility envisaged under the FATF’s risk-based approach is not being fully used. The revisions aim to encourage countries to allow simplified measures as appropriate where countries assess risks to be lower.  

The FATF aims to finalise these revisions and guidance to support this work in 2025.

Under its Mexican Presidency, the FATF aims to increase FSRBs’ voices and participation in FATF work and to strengthen cohesion in the Global Network. This week, FATF made significant progress on this priority. 

First, members agreed to strengthen their support to regional bodies to support high-quality, consistent evaluations across the Global Network. 

Secondly, the FATF President launched a new initiative by inviting two guest jurisdictions, Senegal and Cayman Islands, to input more actively in the FATF and promote further engagement within the region. This initiative aims to broaden the diversity of perspectives and backgrounds at the FATF from regions of the globe that currently do not have many FATF members involved in their regional bodies as joint members. Invitations to guest jurisdictions are for one year, on a rotational basis.

Delegates heard updates on ongoing work, including on revisions to the FATF Standards to reflect the evolution of cross-border payment systems and changes to industry standards, and work on a comprehensive update on terrorist financing risks. The FATF is also working on a project that will help detect and prevent online child sexual exploitation, a crime that has seen a significant increase and targets the most vulnerable members of our society. The FATF’s project will focus on the financial transactions and indicators that can identify suspicious behaviour and help protect children all over the world.

FATF Members officially commenced new work including a project working together with data protection and privacy (DPP) experts, the private sector and other international partners on information sharing consistent with different national rules for AML/CFT/CPF and DPP. FATF also commenced a project to review its processes to ensure that countries do not misuse the FATF requirements to restrict the activities of NPOs.

The Plenary took stock of actions taken to improve gender diversity in the FATF and discussed further proposals to strengthen this work. The FATF will launch a second mentoring programme to strengthen inclusivity and diversity within the FATF and Global Network, building on the WFGN initiative under the Singapore Presidency.