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Ottawa, September 13, 2001
2001-076

Federal Government Publishes Suspicious Transaction Reporting Regulations

The first set of finalized regulations under the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) Act were published on September 12, 2001, in the Canada Gazette, Part II for a 30-day notice period, Secretary of State (International Financial Institutions) Jim Peterson announced.

The regulations require financial institutions and other intermediaries to report financial transactions to the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) where there are reasonable grounds to suspect the transaction is related to money laundering. They also outline the "designated identifying information" that FINTRAC may disclose to law enforcement agencies where it has reasonable grounds to suspect that this information would be relevant to investigating or prosecuting a money laundering offence.

"The first set of regulations is being implemented now in order to allow FINTRAC to begin receiving and processing reports," Secretary of State Peterson said. "These measures, along with others to be introduced in the coming months, will bring Canada’s efforts to combat money laundering in line with those of major industrialized countries."

The published regulations will come into force on November 8, 2001, to provide time for financial institutions and other intermediaries to implement the new reporting requirements. The revised guidelines on suspicious transaction reporting and submitting reports to FINTRAC, as well as a backgrounder on money laundering, will be available on FINTRAC’s Web site at www.fintrac.gc.ca.

The regulations were originally pre-published in Part 1 of the Canada Gazette in February 2001 as part of a larger package of measures to be implemented under the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) Act. These regulations reflect comments received during the pre-publication period.

The remainder of the pre-published regulations, which deal with issues such as client identification and prescribed transaction reporting provisions, are expected to be finalized this fall and published in the Canada Gazette, Part II for a 30-day notice period. It is anticipated that these regulations will begin to take effect in early 2002.

Work is continuing on the development of regulations to implement the reporting requirements for large cross-border movements of currency and monetary instruments prescribed under Part II of the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) Act. It is anticipated that proposed regulations will be pre-published this fall in the Canada Gazette, Part I for a 90-day comment period.

Copies of the published regulations can be obtained from the Canada Gazette Web site at http://canada.gc.ca/gazette/hompar2_e.html, on the Department of Finance Web site at www.fin.gc.ca and from Canadian Government Publishing at 1 800 635-7943.

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