Sanya, 12 November 2019 - President’s summary of outcomes from the FATF Supervisors’ Forum
The Supervisors’ Forum is an initiative of the Chinese Presidency of FATF, to promote more effective supervision by national authorities. Approximately 100 senior financial and professional supervisors, from over 40 countries took part in the event, chaired by the FATF President, Mr. Xiangmin Liu.
The FATF President underscored the importance of supervision in the anti-money laundering/combating financing of terrorism regime. Supervisors play an essential role in identifying, addressing and mitigating the ML/TF risks in the financial and non-financial businesses and professions. But countries need to do better: many jurisdictions face challenges in implementing effective risk-based supervisory regimes, and most of those that have been assessed need to make major or fundamental improvements in this area.
Participants in the Supervisors’ Forum shared their knowledge and experience on common challenges as well as good practices and initiatives to address them. The Forum identified three main areas for action:
* Risk-based supervision: A risk-based approach means that supervisors understand the ML/TF risks, and take the appropriate action to mitigate them. This flexibility allows for a more efficient use of resources, and a dynamic approach to changing threats. The Forum identified the most significant challenges countries face in applying a risk-based approach to supervision and discussed how to overcome these.
* New technology: The increasing use of new technologies to enhance AML/CFT compliance in the private sector, such as advanced analytic tools, brings new challenges for supervisors. They need to exercise effective oversight over how these new technologies are used. There are also new technologies available for supervision, in particular transforming supervisory data to sharpen risk assessment, as well as improving the supervision process. The Forum discussed how supervisors can best leverage the opportunities brought by new technologies.
* International cooperation among supervisors: Cooperation between national supervisors plays a key role in mitigating cross-border ML/TF risks. The Forum considered how to enhance and improve the effectiveness of cross-border supervision.
This initial meeting of the Supervisors’ Forum identified a number of areas that require further actions which will be taken forward at the FATF Plenary and at further meetings of the Supervisors’ Forum, to be held in May 2020.
Twitter
Facebook
Instagram
Linkedin
