Prudential expectations regarding the AMLCO activity report

NBB_2022_04 – 23 February 2022 Circular - Page 1/2 boulevard de Berlaimont 14 - BE-1000 Brussels tel. +32 2 221 54 65 company number: 0203.201.340 RPM Brussels www.bnb.be Circular Brussels, 23 February 2022 Reference: NBB_2022_04 your correspondent:
Benoît Bienfait tel. +32 2 221 36 42 benoit.bienfait@nbb.be Prudential expectations regarding the AMLCO activity report Scope of application

• credit institutions governed by Belgian law, including branches in Belgium of institutions
  governed by the law of another country of the European Economic Area (EEA) or of a third country;
• stockbroking firms governed by Belgian law, including branches in Belgium of companies
  governed by the law of another EEA country or of a third country;
• insurance companies governed by Belgian law which are authorised to carry on life
  insurance activities, including branches in Belgium of companies governed by the law of another EEA country or of a third country;
• payment institutions and electronic money institutions governed by Belgian law, including
  branches in Belgium of institutions governed by the law of another EEA country or of a third country, as well as payment institutions and electronic money institutions authorised in another EEA country which are required to designate a central contact point in Belgium;
• central securities depositories as defined in Article 36/26/1 of the Law of 22 February 1998
  establishing the organic statute of the National Bank of Belgium.

Circular - Page 2/2 NBB_2022_04 – 23 February 2022 Dear Sir, Dear Madam, In accordance with Article 7 of the Regulation of the National Bank of Belgium (the "Bank") of 21 November 2017 on the prevention of money laundering and terrorist financing ("Anti-Money Laundering Regulation"), AMLCOs of obliged financial institutions are expected at least once a year to establish an activity report and send it to the senior management and the statutory governing body. As stated on the Bank's website, "this report is an important document for the management bodies, as it allows them to properly perform their tasks. The objective is to periodically inform these bodies at the highest level of the obliged financial institution of the nature and intensity of the ML/FT risks to which it is exposed, and of the measures taken or recommended by the AMLCO to reduce and effectively manage these risks”. The Bank also makes recommendations on the content of the report on its website1. Although this report is primarily intended for the senior management and the statutory governing body of the obliged financial institutions, a copy must be sent to the Bank. The competent supervisory services review it as part of the implementation of the Bank's supervisory activities with regard to the prevention of money laundering and terrorist financing ("AML/CFT"). Since the entry into force of this reporting obligation for AMLCOs, the Bank's prudential services have noted a great disparity in the quality of the reports produced to date. Indeed, it has been very frequently observed that the recommendations formulated by the Bank on its website are not followed by the obliged financial institutions, or are followed only in part. As a result, most AMLCO reports have little added value for the senior management of the financial institutions to which they are addressed, as they often merely restate the content of internal policies and procedures, omit important information or generally lack relevance. In view of the above, the Bank has deemed it appropriate to define an AMLCO report template (see
Annex) and, through this Circular, to invite obliged financial institutions to adopt it. The Bank believes that
this approach will ultimately lead to an overall improvement in the quality of the AMLCO report and, consequently, in the awareness of AML/CFT issues among senior management of financial institutions. Besides, the widespread use of the AMLCO report template will enable the Bank to adopt a more harmonised and consistent approach to the processing of the AML/CFT information reported annually by the financial institutions subject to its supervision. To this end, the Bank invites the AMLCOs of the obliged financial institutions to provide the Bank with a copy of the above report in .docx file format. In order to strengthen the overall consistency of its reporting expectations for obliged financial institutions, the Bank has also decided to bring forward the deadline for the submission of all AML/CFT reports (including the AMLCO report) to the Bank:

• In view of the possible organisational adjustments that will be required as a result of the adoption
  by the obliged financial institutions of the AMLCO report template, the Bank has decided, for reports due in 2022, to bring forward the submission date to 31 May 2022.
• From 2023 onwards, AML/CFT reporting to the Bank will be due by 15 May each year.
  A copy of this circular is sent to the accredited auditor(s) of your institution.
  Yours faithfully
  Pierre Wunsch
  Governor
  1 Link to the website: https://www.nbb.be/en/financial-oversight/combating-money-laundering-and-financing￾terrorism/information-and-8#2-appointment-of-the-amlco-.