National authorities are investigating 340 reports of suspicious transactions that could be classified as money laundering. Of these, 80% were reported by the national banking system, after noticing the client’s profile does not match the amount of money involved.
The data was provided by the Costa Rican Banking Association (ABC), which held the fourth Congress of Prevention of Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing on Tuesday. There, it was indicated that 42 of the Reports of Suspicious Operations (ROS) drafted by the Costa Rican Institute on Drugs (ICD) have already been sent to the judicial authorities.
The activities related to the investigation are in construction, services, rentals, real estate, IT, automotive sector, legal activities, fishing, and even air transport. The authorities have also investigated Costa Ricans, Mexicans, Nicaraguans, Americans, Italians, among other foreigners.
It’s overwhelming. Central America is a vulnerable place for the transfer of drugs and illicit activities, so we look for partners to be trained […] Our clients have a transactional profile, we have the obligation to know our clients, their operations, and we detect operations that escape their regular profile,”
said Daniel Bañados, a spokesman for ABC.
Guillermo Araya, director of the ICD, highlighted four issues of concern to the international community and in which the country still has to work on to fight money laundering:
-Cryptocurrencies, due to the total anonymity of the person who buys them.
-The identification of the final beneficiary of the transactions (frontmen).
-Use of cash.
-The power of corruption.
The country should sit down to study the issues in depth and align with international trends to avoid bein left behind, we cannot wait to see what happens in other countries while our reality is being eaten away by organized crime that has all the economic resources to operate and, through corruption, all doors open to take root,”
said Araya.