IT solution to prevent money laundering risks and shareholders monitoring will be launched in Moldova by the end of the year - NBM.
The National Bank of Moldova (NBM) announced this, noting that the respective IT solution is in the final stage of implementation and will be launched by the end of this year. The modern system, which will be owned by the National Bank of Moldova, is being implemented with support from the USAID-funded Financial Sector Transparency Activity Project (FSTA). At the same time, at the beginning of this month the training of future users of the IT solution for its efficient management was started. NBM Vice President Vladimir Munteanu attended one of the trainings together with Matthew Macellaro, USAID FSTA Project Director. They were presented the main functionalities of the IT solution, as well as several scenarios of detection of various suspicious activities. NBM Vice President praised the assistance of the USAID FSTA project to support initiatives to strengthen the National Bank's capacity to effectively prevent and combat financial crimes. "Given the current trends of digitalization of the financial system's supervisory functions, at international level the National Bank of Moldova proposed strengthening its supervisory capacities by implementing and applying information technologies", Vladimir Munteanu stressed. For his part, Matthew Macellaro noted that the implementation of this innovative solution was a real challenge, given the huge volume of supervised transactions and, consequently, the complexity of functions that have been developed and still have to be developed. "FSTA will continue to support this effort, and we are confident that this solution will make a significant contribution to reducing the risks of money laundering and other illegal activities," he said. The new information system, which is the first in the region, will provide NBM officials with a number of enhanced functions that will allow oversight of all banking transactions. At the same time, the concept of work based on risk analysis will allow detecting suspicious actions and issuing warnings. This will facilitate both the early detection of money laundering and terrorist financing risks and the detection of suspicious changes in the banks' ownership structure. In addition, the IT solution is developed on a platform that allows the development of new modules and functionalities, in particular in the context of NBM taking over the supervision of the microfinance insurance sectors. Support for the USAID FSTA project to strengthen the national anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regime also includes the organization of training programs for regulators and reporting entities to be led by international experts. At the same time, experts from the USAID FSTA project supported the development of various internal procedures, regulations and projects to amend AML/CFT legislation. NBM's cooperation with USAID started in 1992. During this period, the National Bank received USAID support in building capacity in various areas, including improving banking supervision, modernizing payment systems, preventing money laundering, etc. Also with USAID support, the Single Central Securities Depository, an institution responsible for registering, recording and settling securities issued by Moldovan entities, was launched in 2019. //20.09.2022 - InfoMarket.
