The Netherlands: Anti Money‐Laundering Programmes — The Case of ING
| Published date | 01 February 2000 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb027251 |
| Date | 01 February 2000 |
| Pages | 359-364 |
| Author | Bert Ravenstijn |
| Subject Matter | Accounting & finance |
Journal of Money Laundering Control — Vol. 3 No. 4
The Netherlands: Anti Money-Laundering
Programmes — The Case of ING
Bert Ravenstijn
In the last decade, the forces of globalisation have
created new opportunities for organised crime and
new challenges for legal systems and law enforce-
ment. While the phenomenon of organised crime is
not new, it has grown in recent years and is now
generating and laundering huge illegal profits, and
subsequently investing them in legal business.
Today, we read more often about corruption,
crime committed by business people or public
officials, or about companies caught up in scandals
involving fraud, money laundering and insider
trading than we did ten years ago. Does this mean
that these well-respected people or companies
commit more crimes today than in the past? The
answer is no. But what is new is that society is now
demanding that doing business without full integrity
is unacceptable, and that doing such business while
damaging the economy is reprehensible.
RISKS OF MONEY LAUNDERING
Money laundering poses significant risks to society.
The legal economy is undermined and the institutions
of the countries where the laundered criminal funds
are invested or reinvested are being corrupted.
Money laundering damages the credibility of public
confidence in the financial system in general and
banks in particular. Money laundering also damages
the reputation of the financial institution by its asso-
ciation with this illegal activity. Finally, there is the
risk that further criminal activities can be developed
by allowing criminal funds to be reinvested, for
example to buy into legitimate companies. Money
laundering, which facilitates such reinvestment, has
to be fought as a way to combat organised crime
itself.
RESPONSE IN EUROPE
At the beginning of the 1990s many countries around
the world began implementing anti-money-laundcr-
ing legislation. In Europe this was based on an EC
directive from 1991 and recommendations from
the FATF. The European legislation set out as its
— aid the fight against organised crime;
— prevent the conversion or transfer of property
derived from criminal activity in order to conceal
or disguise the illicit origin of the property;
— prevent the integrity of society from being
undermined by the 'underworld' where it could
freely set up links with the 'upperworld';
— prevent financial institutions and other service
organisations from willingly helping to disguise
criminal gains;
— oblige financial institutions to create a paper trail
documenting financial transactions;
— oblige law enforcement to create an investigative
and prosecution apparatus with the legislative
tools to start and support investigations, in
order to arrest and convict perpetrators and
seize assets derived from crime.
For financial institutions this new legislation had far-
reaching consequences. It meant that it was not
possible any more for a financial institution to
claim: 'I am not part of the problem. I am not com-
mitting a crime and therefore my hands are clean
even though the money I am handling is dirty.'
The financial sector was now obliged to set up pro-
grammes that complied with the new legislation.
But it was not enough to implement procedures
and training of personnel. The banker's lifestyle had
to change, too. 'Integrity' and 'No crooks in the
books' became the overriding slogans.
RESPONSE IN THE NETHERLANDS
The attention of the Dutch banking industry to the
subject of money laundering goes back some way.
Starting in the late 1980s, some of the Dutch banks
already voluntarily reported to the police their
suspicions on money laundering, and in particular
of drug-related transactions. Nevertheless the intro-
duction of the new legislation imposed a number of
obligations on financial institutions that were new
and more severe. Most of the financial institutions
in the Netherlands organised special programmes to
implement policies and procedures to meet these
Journal of Money Laundering Control
Vol. 3,
No.
4,
2000,
pp.
359-364
© Henry Stewart Publications
ISSN 1368-5201
Page 359
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