AMLA now covers jewelry dealers, lawyers, accountants, fund managers

To be at par with international standards, the country’s financial intelligence unit included jewelry dealers, lawyers, accountants, and fund managers in the Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2001 (AMLA) coverage.

To be specific, Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) issued a resolution this week adopting the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing (AML/CTF) guidelines for Designated Non-Financial Businesses and Professions (DNFBPs).

This guidelines cover jewelry dealers in precious stones and metals; company service providers who deliver fund/securities management services for other persons; and persons and entities who, as a business, provide services to organize, create and manage companies and arrangements.

“Inclusion of DNFBPs as covered persons is something new to us. Businesses and professions that, until now, have played a marginal role in our fight against money laundering and terrorism financing, will find themselves heavily involved in it," Executive Director Mel Georgie Racela of the AMLC Secretariat said.

He said that the AMLC itself had very little contact with these DNFBPs prior to 2018, adding that it will "probably take time" for the newly adopted measures to take root.

"But we have one foot through the door, and this is a remarkable achievement. It has been observed in our series of engagements with them at the start of 2018 that the DNFBPs have been largely cooperative with the AMLC, recognizing that they could be used as instruments in the commission of money laundering or terrorism financing. Certainly, professional secrecy cannot be used as a cloak to commit crime. I see that in the foreseeable future, the Philippines will come to embrace international AML/ CTF standards more and more,” Racela further said.

The Guidelines for DNFBPs were patterned largely after the “Casino Implementing Rules and Regulations” (CIRR), which the AMLC approved in 2017.

Both casinos, the non-financial businesses, and professions above are considered DNFBPs by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the international policy-making body that sets standards and promotes effective implementation of measures to combat money laundering and terrorism financing.

Under the Guidelines, the AMLC oversees compliance by DNFBPs with the provisions of the AMLA, as amended. The Guidelines that lawyers and accountants who provide the services enumerated in AMLA, as amended, are also considered covered persons, and must therefore report covered and suspicious transactions to the AMLC.

“The Asia Pacific Group on Money Laundering or the APG, noted in our last mutual evaluation in 2008, that the Philippines’ lack of a regulatory framework for DNFBPs was a technical compliance issue," Racela said.

"With the adoption of the Guidelines, the Philippines would be more technically compliant with international standards," he added.