SA remains on FATF grey list

SA has still not done enough to be removed from the grey list of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the global financial watchdog said on Friday. At the conclusion of a three-day meeting in Singapore, the FATF said that while SA had made some progress since it was greylisted last year, it still had a lot of work to do, reports Fin24. The watchdog identified several strategic deficiencies that SA still needs to address. The announcement was broadly in line with expectations. Few believed SA had done enough to fix all the shortcomings identified by the task force 16 months ago. Treasury, which has been helping co-ordinate SA’s response to the greylisting, has said it thinks SA will only have fixed all the problems the FATF identified by mid-2025. The FATF said SA still needs to:

* show it can work and share information with international partners;

* show there are ‘proportionate and effective’ sanctions for not complying with anti-money laundering and terrorist financing laws;

* ensure that police and the Hawks have ‘timely access to accurate and up-to-date’ information on who owns SA companies;

* show it can investigate and prosecute serious and complex financial crimes; and

* prove it can identify, seize, and confiscate proceeds of crimes and implement effective targeted sanctions.

The FATF praised SA for making progress in some of the deficiencies it had previously identified, such as updating its supervisory risk assessment tools for non-profits, casinos, and attorney trust accounts. The Fin24 report says it also welcomed the Financial Intelligence Centre's (FIC) publication of an updated risk assessment on terrorist financing. The updated assessment, published just days ago, raised the country's risk of being used as a hub for terrorist financing from moderate to high. The FIC said the threat emanated chiefly from the revived Islamic State, which has been making inroads into southern Africa.

Full Fin24 report