Hanoi (VNA) – The risk of money laundering in Vietnam is at “averagehigh” level, and that of terrorist financing at “low” level, according to arecent report released by the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV).
According to the SBV’s report on national risk assessment on money launderingand terrorist financing in 2012-2017 period, the risk of money laundering wasseen in different sectors in the economy like banking, real estate andsecurities.
Particularly, the risk of money laundering in the banking sector was at a “high” level as it accounted for almost 90 percent ofsuspicious transactions.
Though not all the crime money was put into the money laundering process, theresults showed that compared to other sectors in the economy, there was highpossibility that the criminals used the banking sector to legalise theirillegal money.
To hide the illegal money earned, criminals tended touse the banking accounts under other people’s names to receive and send theillegal money, the report said.
The real estate sector is considered an attractive channel for money launderingas it can absorb huge money amounts, with transactions carried out by cash orbanking transfer and not through property trading floors, making it difficultfor competent authorities to identify the source of the money.
Criminals often asked their relatives to buy and then transfer real estate.
Meanwhile, money laundering risk in the insurance sector is classified as“average low”, and that in securities and casino at “average”, and accounting,auditing, law and people credit fund at “low”.
Earlier, Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue recently signed a decision toissue an action plan to handle money laundering and terrorist financing for2019-2020.
The action plan is also expected to meetinternational standards on prevention of money laundering and terroristfinancing while serving the multi-lateral evaluation of the Asia-Pacific Groupon Money Laundering (APG) and terrorism financing prevention.-VNA
VNA