(Conclusion)
MANILA, Philippines — The culmination of the Anti-Money Laundering Council’s thorough analysis of transaction reports is the Intelligence Report, a document that encapsulates the AMLC’s findings and conclusions based on relevant data.
This report is crafted with partner law enforcement and government agencies such as the Philippine National Police, the National Bureau of Investigation or Bureau of Customs, depending on the nature of the suspected illegal activity.
The gathered information is analyzed to produce the Financial Intelligence Report, a confidential document that is shared only with relevant authorities.
The FIR details the specifics of suspicious or covered transactions, the parties involved and any connections to wider criminal activities. It is often the trigger for further investigation or legal action.
Based on the AMLC’s latest Annual Report, the dirty money watchdog collected 176.9 million of CTRs and 10.3 million of STRs from 2019 to 2022.
In 2023, the AMLC received around 15 million CTRs and STRs last year from 14,000 covered persons.
During the first semester of 2024, the AMLC shared 1,437 financial intelligence products to various stakeholders, 44 percent higher than the 998 disseminations in the same period last year.
As financial crime continues to evolve, the AMLC has identified new and emerging methods of money laundering in the Philippines amid the increased use of online services and cybercrimes during the pandemic.
In a report, the AMLC said it recorded 17,178 STRs pertaining to Nigerian-related crimes in 2020, seven times higher than the 2,236 reports in 2019. The total value of the STRs jumped by 261 percent to P998.6 million in 2020 from P276.6 million in 2019.
But as lockdowns eased, the number of STRs linked to Nigerians declined by 47 percent to 9,036 in 2021, while the total value plunged to P569.9 million during the same year.
In a separate report, the AMLC flagged over P1.56 billion in suspicious transactions related to the online sexual exploitation of children from 2020 to 2022. STRs related to the online sexual abuse and exploitation of children (OSAEC) reached a total of 182,729 in the three-year period.
In 2022 alone, the number of OSAEC-related STRs jumped by 35.2 percent to 92,200 from 68,214 in 2021. But the value of the STRs fell by 52 percent to P478.28 million in 2022 from P996.7 million in 2021.
“The growing demand and availability of child sexual exploitation materials especially during the pandemic has exacerbated what is already a serious problem in the country,” the AMLC earlier said.
Nearly all (94.47 percent) of the STRs were filed under “child pornography” from July 2020 to December 2022. AMLC also noted that the bulk (87.52 percent) of STRs involved remittances. Foreign remittances accounted for 81 percent or P751.36 million of the transactions.
Adopting new strategies
According to the AMLC, it plans to adopt new strategies and technologies to detect and counter emerging ways of money laundering.
“The AMLC has acquired an artificial intelligence solution to strengthen the detection and prevention of money laundering, terrorist financing, proliferation financing activities, through analysis of CTRs and STRs. This is expected to be operationalized this year,” the AMLC said.
AMLC executive director Matthew David has said they need AI assistance in managing millions of transaction reports to detect more activities of money laundering and terrorist financing.
By utilizing AI, he said analysts would be able to focus their efforts on the most critical cases while reducing the risk of missing significant threats.
“Further, the AMLC is continuously improving its operational processes through the issuance of various Inter-Office Orders and Guidelines,” the AMLC said.
“Lastly, the AMLC ensures that its personnel, investigators and analysts receive relevant capacity-building activities to equip them with advanced strategies for processing and analyzing data,” it added.
The AMLC is an independent government agency mandated to implement the Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2001 and certain aspects of the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020 (ATA).
Aside from collecting transaction reports, the AMLC also conducts investigations into money laundering and terrorism financing activities. It has the authority to enlist assistance from government agencies and government-owned corporations to aid in its operations.
The AMLC can initiate civil forfeiture and other remedial proceedings through the Office of the Solicitor General. It can also file criminal complaints with the Department of Justice or the Office of the Ombudsman for the prosecution of cases.
The AMLC also applies before the Court of Appeals to freeze any monetary instruments or properties believed to be the proceeds of unlawful activities. The AMLC is responsible for preserving, managing or disposing of assets subject to freeze orders, asset preservation orders, or judgments of forfeiture.