The Londoner

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has implemented several measures to comply with anti-money laundering (AML) regulations and combat the financing of terrorism (CFT) .  1. AML Law and Regulations : The UAE has established specific laws and regulations to combat money laundering and terrorist financing. These laws define various offenses related to money laundering and prescribe penalties for non-compliance. 2. Designated Authority : The UAE has designated a competent authority responsible for overseeing AML/CFT efforts and ensuring compliance across the financial sector. The authority may vary depending on the emirate or the type of financial institution. 3. Customer Due Diligence (CDD) : UAE's AML regulations require financial institutions and designated non-financial businesses and professions ( DNFBPs ) to conduct customer due diligence before establishing a business relationship. This includes verifying the identity of customers, beneficial owners, and understanding the nature of...

Book Review by Sikander Hayat  As far as I have been able to decipher, this book is about the emergence of an event which  is  totally unforeseen, unpredictable and which cannot be modelled for by our usual  forecasting models . Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb is a great book to read despite  its length and tone which shows its anger against the current establishment in academia,  industry and just about anyone in high places. Nassim has been a quant in his previous life,  has practised financial forecasting methods in trying to choose the eventual winners and has  tried to use his practitioner's knowledge to inject life into the idea of his Black Swan thesis.  Although he has used forecasting models in his life as a trader, he is fully aware of the short  comings of these models and in fact, he makes a strong case against modelling risk with the  current tool...

By Sikander Hayat  It is fascinating to understand the creation of money out of thin air by the central banks and governments across the world. How a fiat currency gains credence and what is it backed by is a very interesting subject. How piece of paper or some digits on computer screen can be called money and can be exchanged for physical goods is fascinating to observe. Off course value of such a currency is only valid as long as people trust it. Is there a future for current paper currencies or these are going to be replaced by digital ones. With the meteoric rise of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies , it is a matter of time before central banks will have to come up with a mechanism to integrate these into fabric of current currency universe and find a way to regulate them. I assume that the currently cryptocurrencies derive their value from the use by money launderers and criminal element of our societies as it is possibly the best way to make their b...

The French finance minister, Michel Sapin, has announced a series of initiatives to improve the tracking of terrorism financing, Le Monde newspaper reports. The measures include better supervision of prepaid bank cards, which the ministry believes played an important role in the preparation of the 13 November attacks. The new measures will make it harder for card users to remain anonymous. Currently, prepaid cards can be recharged without identity checks, so long as they do not exceed 2,500 euros over one year, according to the AFP news agency. "There are new means of payment which have been created which should be on our radar," Bruno Dalles, head of the finance ministry's Tracfin intelligence unit, told AFP.    Read the full story at bbc.co.uk

  EU leaders have agreed on a roadmap for eurozone integration beyond the deal on centralised banking supervision, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said. Specific dates have not yet been agreed for the phases of integration. But the EU summit chairman, Herman Van Rompuy, said a deal should be reached next year on a joint resolution scheme for winding up failed banks. Mr Van Rompuy's far-reaching roadmap was the main topic of the two-day Brussels summit. Speaking after the summit talks, French President Francois Hollande said: "There is no doubt today about the integrity of the eurozone - Europe cannot now be taken by surprise." But beyond the banking reforms, he said, Europe must address the problems of unemployment and feeble growth. The deal to make the European Central Bank (ECB) the chief regulator should pave the way for direct recapitalisation of struggling eurozone banks by the main bailout fund, the...

Coutts & Co, the private bank used by the Queen, has been fined £8.75m for failing to take required precautions against money laundering in the first case to emerge from a Financial Services Authority probe into the way banks handle accounts of overseas politicians and other high-risk customers. The FSA said that Coutts, which is part of the Royal Bank of Scotland, routinely failed to gather crucial information about so-called politically exposed persons, including the source of their funds, and did not properly monitor their transactions. These violations of UK rules continued from 2007 to 2010, when they were uncovered during the FSA’s industry-wide review. Read the full article here.