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- UK Economic Crime And Corporate Transparency Act Now Law
- Macroeconomic Warning Sees Worldline Stock Collapse
- Latest UK Fraud Stats Show Little Sign Of APP Fraud Steadying
- E-Krona Could Boost Security And Competition In Payments, Say Merchants
- ANZ CEO Writes To 6m Customers To Warn Of 'Sophisticated' Scams
- Singapore Authority Rebukes DBS, Citi After Data Centre Fallout
- Size Matters In Revolut’s Struggle For UK Banking Licence
- Barclays Warns Of 23 Percent Rise In Student Money Mule Activity
- Greece To Mandate Instant Payment Acceptance For Freelancers
- US Treasury Seeks To Cut Hamas Funding Via Crypto Mixing
- Bank Of Lithuania Censures Irish Payment Institution
- Australian Fintech Unicorn Airwallex To Acquire Mexico’s MexPago
UK Economic Crime And Corporate Transparency Act Now Law
New UK legislation aimed at combating fraud and corruption and preventing money laundering received royal assent on Thursday (October 26).
Under the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act, Companies House will receive enhanced abilities to verify the identities of company directors and remove fraudulent organisations from the company register. It will also be able to share information with criminal investigation agencies.
Law enforcement agencies will also benefit from greater powers to seize, freeze and recover crypto-assets, and prosecutors will be better able to hold large corporations accountable for malpractice.
“I am committed to ensuring criminals do not profit from their offending and this landmark act will help law enforcement clampdown on the tactics they use,” said Suella Braverman, home secretary.
“It will have a big impact on our ability to fight organised crime, including terrorist funding, fraud and money laundering, and that will ultimately help keep us all safe.”
Macroeconomic Warning Sees Worldline Stock Collapse
Worldline stock has lost more than half its value since the company published its Q3 results, due to mediocre revenue growth and poor outlook for 2024 and beyond.
The French multinational grew its total revenue to €1.1bn, an increase of 4.8 percent year-over-year, but warned of “macroeconomic deterioration” in some of its core European markets.
In particular, it said that consumers in Germany have started to allocate “more of their spendings to non-discretionary verticals” rather than discretionary, affecting the company’s growth and profitability.
Worldline also said that increasing cybercrime, newly emerging fraud patterns and regulatory activity have “tightened” the company’s risk appetite.
As a result, Worldline said it has terminated its relationship with merchants whose costs and potential risks did not match its revised requirements.
Latest UK Fraud Stats Show Little Sign Of APP Fraud Steadying
Criminals stole £580m through unauthorised and authorised fraud in the first half of 2023, a 2 percent decrease compared with the same period in 2022, as UK financial services point the finger at social media firms.
Some 77 percent of authorised push payment (APP) fraud started online and another 17 percent started through telecommunications networks, according to the latest report published by UK Finance.
Online APP fraud cases tend to include lower-value scams, such as purchase scams, and account for 32 percent of total losses.
Meanwhile, 17 percent of cases originated in telecommunications, with these tending to include higher value cases, such as impersonation fraud, and so account for 45 percent of total losses.
E-Krona Could Boost Security And Competition In Payments, Say Merchants
Retail traders have said that Sweden’s e-krona, its central bank digital currency (CBDC), could offer greater safety and competition in the country’s payments market.
Research was carried out as part of the Riksbank’s investigation into the possible issuance of a CBDC.
The Riksbank also highlighted that many merchants are struggling with the cost of payments, and want increased competition and transparent pricing models.
The reason that the central bank believes this is the case is due to the market being “characterised by a few dominant actors”.
The research also shows that there is strong public confidence in the ability of authorities to resolve payment problems in crisis situations, and that many traders have different types of backup solutions for internet connection problems, accepting several different payment methods, including card payments offline.
“We believe that an e-krona could increase resilience to disruptions, as an additional option if other payment methods are not working,” the Riksbank says.
ANZ CEO Writes To 6m Customers To Warn Of 'Sophisticated' Scams
Shayne Elliott, CEO of Australia’s ANZ bank, has written to 6m customers to warn of a rise in “sophisticated” fraud and scams.
The letter, which will be received via email or post, includes a six-point list that aims to help customers spot scams and not fall victim to them.
Tips include exercising caution around unsolicited links, even if they appear to come from legitimate sources, and never giving unsolicited callers remote access to one’s computer or banking details — even if they claim to be from ANZ.
Customers are also encouraged to use PayID, an instant payments addressing service that allows payers to see who a payee’s address is registered to before sending a payment.
In 2002, as covered by Vixio, Australians are believed to have lost more than A$3.1bn ($2bn) to fraud and scams — an 80 percent increase on the previous year.
Singapore Authority Rebukes DBS, Citi After Data Centre Fallout
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has ordered DBS and Citibank to conduct a “thorough investigation” into failures to restore their data centres following outages earlier this month.
On October 14, both DBS and Citibank experienced an outage in their services due to a failure in their data centres, and both failed to restore their systems within a four-hour timeframe required by law.
The MAS added that banks must also not exceed more than four hours of unscheduled downtime within a single 12-month period.
Following internal investigations, the central bank said it will take “appropriate supervisory action” against the two banks.
According to media reports, the incidents were the result of a technical issue at a data centre run by US firm Equinix, where the temperature of the chilled water system rose in some of the halls during a planned system upgrade, affecting its operations.
Size Matters In Revolut’s Struggle For UK Banking Licence
Revolut’s size may be a factor in its struggle to obtain a UK banking licence, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Saturday (October 21).
The UK fintech giant has been seeking regulatory approval in the UK since January 2021. According to the FT, the fact that Revolut has nearly 8m customers in the UK has been a significant challenge, in addition to questions surrounding financial reporting.
As reported by Vixio, Revolut was given an extension on its annual financial statement for the second time in September. The move came amid concerns about £477m of the neobank’s revenue from its 2021 annual report that its auditor, BDO, was unable to account for.
Earlier in October, the FT reported that Revolut is also under scrutiny by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for alleged failure to report £500,000 in suspicious transactions.
External factors, such as recent banking turmoil, may have also had an impact on the delay in obtaining the licence, making the regulators more cautious, the report said.
Barclays Warns Of 23 Percent Rise In Student Money Mule Activity
Barclays bank has issued an “urgent warning” to university students in the UK, following a 23 percent rise in money mule incidents involving student products in October 2022.
Two in five money mules identified by Barclays are under the age of 25, and one in five are under 21.
Additional research found that more than a quarter of 18-21 year olds would be happy to move money on someone else’s behalf if they got paid for it.
Likewise, about two thirds were not aware that money mule activity can result in a criminal record and problems accessing credit.
Ross Martin, head of digital safety at Barclays, urged young people to be wary of “get-rich-quick schemes” that involve passing money through their bank accounts.
He added that these are typically launched through fake profiles on social media, job advertising boards, dating apps and loans and investment ads.
Greece To Mandate Instant Payment Acceptance For Freelancers
A new bill endorsed by Greece’s Ministry of National Economy and Finance would mandate the use of IRIS, an account-to-account (A2A) payment system, by the country’s freelancers.
As per the bill, freelancers and self-employed persons are required to link their business account to IRIS, and must accept IRIS payments from any customer who chooses this payment method.
In addition, businesses that are currently required to accept card payments will now be required to accept IRIS payments as well effective as of December 2024.
The ministry said that by using IRIS, transactions will be commission-free and will also help fight tax evasion. However, IRIS payments are currently capped at €500.
US Treasury Seeks To Cut Hamas Funding Via Crypto Mixing
The US Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has proposed a rule that identifies international crypto mixing as a class of transactions of “primary money laundering concern”.
If finalised, the rule would require financial institutions, including money service businesses, to comply with additional recordkeeping and reporting requirements when they provide services to crypto mixers.
The agency said the rule is intended to increase transparency around crypto mixing and combat its use by “malicious actors”, including Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and North Korea.
The proposal follows a decision by the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to sanction ten key Hamas members and financial facilitators after the group’s attacks on Israel in early October.
The action targeted members managing a secret Hamas investment portfolio, a Qatar-based financial facilitator with close ties to the Iranian regime, a key Hamas commander and a Gaza-based crypto exchange.
Bank Of Lithuania Censures Irish Payment Institution
The Bank of Lithuania has determined that NomuPay, an Irish payment institution, did not fulfil its equity capital requirements in the eastern European market.
NomuPay notified the central bank about its non-compliance and took steps to eliminate the violation, the authority said.
The regulator has therefore opted not to fine the company, but has publicly announced its violation of regulations.
NomuPay also failed to submit the reports as required in relation to its accounts in credit institutions within the legal deadlines.
The Bank of Lithuania warned the payment institution of this violation and obliged it to submit these reports.
Australian Fintech Unicorn Airwallex To Acquire Mexico’s MexPago
Airwallex, a global business-to-business (B2B) payments platform, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire MexPago, a Mexico-based payment service provider and Institution of Electronic Payment Funds (IFPE) licence-holder.
In a statement, Airwallex said the acquisition will enable it to expand its financial infrastructure into Latin America and advance its mission to support businesses to operate across borders.
The acquisition is part of Airwallex’s broader growth strategy in the Americas, where the company has seen more than 460 percent revenue growth in the past year.
“This is a critical milestone for Airwallex,” said Ravi Adusumilli, executive general manager for Americas at Airwallex, which in 2022 was valued at $5.5bn.
“With the acquisition of MexPago, we’re on a path to become the number one payments and financial platform for modern businesses to go global.”
