Julia Layton in her article ‘How Money Laundering Works’, said “it’s a daunting task to trace the origins of any deposit when there are about 700,000 global wire transfers occurring every day. Which is the dirty money and which is the clean stuff? Within the United States, there are two primary methods employed by the government to detect and combat money laundering: legislation and law enforcement.”

And according to Min Zhu, Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Money laundering and the financing of terrorism are financial crimes with economic effects.
They can threaten the stability of a country’s financial sector or its external stability more generally. Effective anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism regimes are essential to protect the integrity of markets and of the global financial framework as they help mitigate the factors that facilitate financial abuse.
Action to prevent and combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism thus responds not only to a moral imperative, but also to an economic need.

The IMF noted that the international community has made the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing a priority. The IMF is especially concerned about the possible consequences money laundering, terrorist financing, and related governance issues have on the integrity and stability of the financial sector and the broader economy. These activities can undermine the integrity and stability of financial institutions and systems, discourage foreign investment, and distort international capital flows. They may have negative consequences for a country’s financial stability and macroeconomic performance, resulting in welfare losses, draining resources from more productive economic activities, and even have destabilising spill-over effects on the economies of other countries. The IMF also has noted that in an increasingly interconnected world, the negative effects of these activities are global, and their impact on the financial integrity and stability of countries is widely recognised.
Money launderers exploit both the complexity inherent in the global financial system as well as differences between national anti-money laundering laws and systems, and they are especially attracted to jurisdictions with weak or ineffective controls where they can move their funds more easily without detection. Moreover, problems in one country can quickly spread to other countries in the region or in other parts of the world.
Strong AML/CFT regimes enhance financial sector integrity and stability, which in turn facilitate countries’ integration into the global financial system. They also strengthen governance and fiscal administration. The integrity of national financial systems is essential
to the financial sector and macroeconomic stability both on a national and international level, the IMF declared.
Here in Guyana the government is making strong and committed efforts to become part of the international fight against the money laundering scourge by enacting legislation in accordance with international guidelines. However, unfortunately, the political Opposition is doing its utmost to stall this process via its brinkmanship politics.
The private sector which, as expected, has expressed grave concerns about the implication of sanctions against this country if the deadline for the ratification of the Anti-Money Laundering and Financing the Countering of Terrorism (AMLCFT) (amendment) Bill is not met, and because of this, it has been dubbed pro-PPP.
It seems that anyone who takes a pro-Guyana stance is considered pro-PPP. However, the issue here is not pro-anybody. It is one of ‘pro-sensible’ and ‘pro-reasonable’.
The Opposition with its combined one-seat majority is behaving like an excited kid with a new toy, but unlike that kid’s behaviour, the repercussions and adversities resulting from sanctions for not meeting the deadline for enactment of appropriate AMLCFT legislation could rupture our financial and economic stability which would result in severe hardships for our people.
But this seems to be of little concern to the Opposition. More important for them is to pursue their narrow and selfish political agenda and this has been demonstrated once again by their non-participation of the meeting of the Special Select Committee on AMLCFT on Tuesday.