Bank Negara receives over 5mil CTRs valued at RM483bil in nine months to September

KUALA LUMPUR: Bank Negara Malaysia has received over five million cash transations worth RM483 billion in nine months after it lowered the daily cash threshold report (CTR) to RM25,000 from RM50,000.

Governor Datuk Nor Shamsiah Mohd Yunus said while it was too early to draw any concrete conclusions, the total value of cash transactions reported had increased marginally, while the number of CTR reports received had nearly doubled.

Still, the significant increase in CTR since January provided Bank Negara important data that enabled more rigorous monitoring of peculiarities in cash transactions and identification of ML/TF (money laundering/terrorist financing) risk on newly-identified entities that had not been captured previously, she added.

“These additional insights also lead to better quality of disclosures to relevant law enforcement agencies especially in relation to fraud, tax evasion and corruption crimes,” Nor Shamsiah said at the 11th International Conference on Financial Crime and Terrorism Financing (IFCTF) 2019 and launch of Malaysia Financial Intelligence Network (MyFINet) here today.

The move to reduce the daily CTR effective January 1 this year is to bring Malaysia’s CTR on par with other countries, as the previous threshold was too high and disconnected from the size of the country’s economy, especially in relations to purchasing power.

Meanwhile, MyFINet is a public-private partnership (PPP) between the law enforcement agencies and financial institutions in combating ML, TF, proliferation financing and other serious crimes.

At present, the PPP members include Royal Malaysia Police, Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, Royal Malaysian Customs Department and Securities Commission as well as 17 financial institutions comprising banks and money services providers.

The partnership serves as a platform to encourage sharing of intelligence and current topical issues between the law enforcement agencies and financial institutions in managing significant threats to the nation.

This is in tandem with the new global norm of sharing of financial intelligence already implemented in countries like the UK, Australia, the US, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said a key component of PPP models throughout the world was the emphasis on personal data protection and confidentiality, benchmarked against the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

He said for Malaysia’s PPP, law enforcement and financial institutions would continue to adhere to Malaysia’s data protection legal framework in combating financial crimes.

“I believe such noble effort need to be strengthened and expanded further to allow more parties especially the public at large to exercise their responsibility in fighting against corruption and financial crime. Apart from that, continuous enhancement should also be done holistically,” Dr Mahathir said in his speech.

“Therefore, we need to continuously work in building these critical elements of trust and transparency, through open dialogues and collaboration among the relevant players, accelerate reforms and strengthen institutions, policies and legal frameworks.

“This will ultimately enable Malaysia to effectively play its role in the global fight against financial crime and terrorism financing. We must be persistent and remain focus in delivering this agenda,” he added.

Source: NST