ARCCO’s 1st Webinar withAMLC

In keeping with its mission to continuously enhance the culture of compliance in the money service business industry, the Association of Remittance Company Compliance Officers- Philippines, Inc. (ARCCO) launched its first webinar on 9 June 2020 entitled “E-Conversation with the AMLC”. The event was hosted through an online video communication platform and was well-attended by more than 100 hundred participants from various money service businesses and pawnshops in the Philippines.

Gracing the event were Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) Executive Director, Atty. Mel Georgie Racela; Mr. Alvin L. Bermido, Head of the Commitments and Policy Group of the AMLC Secretariat, and Mr. Jerry Leal, Director of the Detection and Prevention Department.

The webinar was a moderated question-and-answer session between the participants and the AMLC officials. Participants raised industry concerns such as the possible impact of the proposed Anti-Terrorism Law on the compliance processes of MSBs particularly in implementing freeze orders on accounts of suspected terrorists; emerging typologies of possible money laundering activities and patterns of suspicious transactions during the community quarantines, and action items on the third Asia Pacific Group (APG) mutual evaluation.

In his responses to the questions, Executive Director Racela emphasized the urgency of passing an effective anti-terror bill, otherwise, the Philippines faces the risk of being included in an international “grey list” of nations categorized as countries with weak counter-terrorism financing rules. He stressed on the immediacy of freezing the accounts of suspected terrorist in order to suppress these group’s unlawful activities.

ARCCO is representative of at least 75% percent of registered non-bank financial institutions in the Philippines, leading entities included, and is expected to expand its membership in the future. The association itself is a duly-registered non-stock, non-profit organization and had its successful formal launching event in April 2019.

ARCCO’s first webinar: e-chats with the AMLC

In keeping with its mission to continuously enhance the culture of compliance in the money service business industry, the Association of Remittance Company Compliance Officers- Philippines, Inc. (ARCCO) launched its first webinar on 9 June 2020 entitled “E-Conversation with the AMLC”. The event was hosted through an online video communication platform and was well-attended by more than 100 hundred participants from various money service businesses and pawnshops in the Philippines.

Gracing the event were Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) Executive Director, Atty. Mel Georgie Racela; Mr. Alvin L. Bermido, Head of the Commitments and Policy Group of the AMLC Secretariat, and Mr. Jerry Leal, Director of the Detection and Prevention Department.

The webinar was a moderated question-and-answer session between the participants and the AMLC officials. Participants raised industry concerns such as the possible impact of the proposed Anti-Terrorism Law on the compliance processes of MSBs particularly in implementing freeze orders on accounts of suspected terrorists; emerging typologies of possible money laundering activities and patterns of suspicious transactions during the community quarantines, and action items on the third Asia Pacific Group (APG) mutual evaluation.

In his responses to the questions, Executive Director Racela emphasized the urgency of passing an effective anti-terror bill, otherwise, the Philippines faces the risk of being included in an international “grey list” of nations categorized as countries with weak counter-terrorism financing rules. He stressed on the immediacy of freezing the accounts of suspected terrorist in order to suppress these group’s unlawful activities.

ARCCO is representative of at least 75% percent of registered non-bank financial institutions in the Philippines, leading entities included, and is expected to expand its membership in the future. The association itself is a duly-registered non-stock, non-profit organization and had its successful formal launching event in April 2019.