Strengthened EU rules to tackle money laundering, tax avoidance and terrorism financing enter into force

26 June 2017

The Fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive strengthens the existing rules and improves transparency to prevent tax avoidance. This entry into force comes as discussions with the European Parliament and the Council on extra measures further reinforcing the Directive are already at an advanced stage.

Today the Commission also publishes a report which will support Member State authorities in better addressing money laundering risks in practice. As required by the new directive, the Commission assessed the money laundering and terrorist financing risks of different sectors and financial products. The report published today identifies the areas most at risk and the most widespread techniques used by criminals to launder illicit funds.

Strengthening the existing rules

The Fourth Anti-Money Laundering  reinforces the existing rules by introducing the following changes:

• reinforcing the risk assessment obligation for banks, lawyers, and accountants;
• setting clear transparency requirements about beneficial ownership for companies. This information will be stored in a central register, such as commercial registers, and will be available to national authorities and obliged entities
• facilitating cooperation and exchange of information between Financial Intelligence Units from different Member States to identify and follow suspicious transfers of money to prevent and detect crime or terrorist activities;
• establishing a coherent policy towards non-EU countries that have deficient anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing rules;
• reinforcing the sanctioning powers of competent authorities.

Improving the risk assessment across the internal market

The Supranational Risk Assessment Reportis a tool to help Member States identify, analyse and address money laundering and terrorist financing risks. It analyses the risks in the financial and non-financial sector and looks also into newly emerging risks such as virtual currencies or crowdfunding platforms. The report includes:  

• an extensive mapping of risks per relevant area and a list of the means more frequently used by criminals to launder money.

• recommendations to Member States how to address identified risks appropriately, for example by putting more emphasis on risk analysis or supervisory actions on specific activities.

Finally the Commission also commits to examining options to enhance the operation and cross-border cooperation of Financial Intelligence Units. 

Full press release

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