Keynote: ‘Everyone Is Doing Badly’: AML After 30 Years - A Conversation with David Lewis, Executive Secretary of FATF

In 1989, the Group of Seven leading industrialised nations formed the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) to create international standards in Anti-Money Laundering (AML).

The following year, it published its first set of 40 Recommendations. Thirty years later, FATF has become a highly influential international body, with competence for not only AML but also Countering the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) and anti-proliferation finance.

Over two hundred countries now claim that they seek to meet the group’s requirements. And yet – despite three decades of work, the problem of illicit finance remains just as prevalent and globally widespread. According to recent comments by David Lewis, the head of FATF’s secretariat, “everyone is doing badly” in the fight against financial crime. In a rare interview, David will be joining us to talk more about his thoughts on the scale and character of the challenge we face, FATF’s successes and failures, and why, so far, thirty years of hard work has not yet translated into a decisive blow against financial crime.

We will also explore what he believes needs to change to get us back on track.