The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network will formalize FinCEN Exchange, a new forum to facilitate public- and private-sector information sharing on financial crimes data, Sigal Mandelker told the ABA/ABA Financial Crimes Enforcement Conference today. Mandelker is Treasury under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.
Through the program, FinCEN will coordinate with law enforcement to convene regular briefings for financial institutions to exchange information on illicit finance threats — including specific information and broader “financial typologies,” a term that refers to money laundering methods.
This effort “significantly contributes to our ability to combat the increasingly sophisticated money laundering efforts we face,” Mandelker said, noting that FinCEN Exchange builds on a series of a dozen pilot briefings held for 40 institutions since 2015. “It is time to institutionalize this program within our AML framework,” she added.
Mandelker emphasized that FinCEN Exchange is “not intended to add a regulatory burden to your financial institutions. We’re not imposing any new requirements.” Instead, she explained, it is designed to help banks “channel resources toward high-priority targets.”
