On 14 July 2017, the Dutch Minister of Finance (the Minister) published a report (the Report) on the consultation of the draft legislative proposal of the Act implementing the Fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive (2015/849) (Vierde anti-witwasrichtlijn) (the Implementation Act). A public consultation of the Implementation Act was held between 15 July 2016 and 16 August 2016. The Implementation Act implements the Fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive (and the Wire Transfer Regulation (revised) (2015/847)) by amending the Act on the prevention of money laundering and financing of terrorism (Wet ter voorkoming van witwassen en financiering van terrorisme).
The Minister received a total of 21 responses to the consultation. Among other things, respondents indicated that:
- a risk based approach will lead to an increase in administrative costs and burden, in particular for smaller undertakings. According to the Minister, the Fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive does not allow member states to deviate from this risk based approach. The Minister acknowledges that this may lead to increased administrative costs; this will be addressed in more detail in the explanatory notes to the revised legislative proposal;
- the definition of ‘senior managing officials’ (hoger leidinggevend personeel) as used in the definition of ‘ultimate beneficial owner’ (UBO) is not in line with recommendations made by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). The Minister refutes this. The Minister also points out that some respondents have mistakenly assumed that listed companies subject to disclosure requirements consistent with Union law or subject to equivalent international standards ensuring adequate transparency of ownership information are not subject to the obligation to identify (a) senior managing official(s) as UBOs in case they are unable to identify other natural persons as UBOs; and
- it is not desirable that the Implementation Act will no longer list situations in which simplified customer due diligence is always permitted. The Minister indicates that the Fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive does not allow member states to include such a list in their local laws. Whether simplified customer due diligence is permitted will need to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
The Report provides that a revised legislative proposal will be submitted to the Dutch Parliament shortly after the summer. The Minister points out that the implementation deadline of 26 June 2017 has expired and that the aim is therefore to have the Implementation Act come into force as soon as possible.
View the Report (Dutch only), 14 July 2017.
