Swiss anti-money laundering act (AMLA)

⚡tl;dr the scope of application of the anti money laundering act is broad and highly relevant for companies providing money related services regulated companies must implement kyc procedures and join an sro having expert advice early enough will enable your company to comply with the requirements and grow successfully book a free call with us what is it? aml stands for anti money laundering the anti money laundering act (amla) aims to avoid and prevent money laundering and other similar activities, such as terrorism financing the amla's applicability is rather broad and is therefore highly relevant for many companies the swiss aml regulation is made up of three core principles duties financial intermediaries are required to identify their clients as well as the beneficial owner of the assets, keep and maintain client files, monitor their client relationships, implement organizational measures, and report events of suspected money laundering supervision all financial intermediaries are monitored to ensure they comply with their duties sanctions non compliance can result in sanctions for the financial intermediaries when is it relevant? the anti money laundering act (amla) applies to all financial intermediaries it notably comes into consideration for a company involved in money exchanges (e g , from chf to usd) or money flows (e g , payment provider services) this is for example, already the case when a phone operator offers their clients to buy public transport tickets via sms in this case, the phone operator acts as a payment provider and must comply with aml requirements generally, if money is moved in one way or another, you should consider whether aml requirements apply to your services there are exceptions , notably when the activity is not pursued professionally, but it is important to assess the scope of application of the law what do i have to do? the first step is to define whether your activity is subject to the regulation once this is established, you can either decide to (i) re structure your activity to avoid the application of the regulation, (ii) partner with a regulated company, or (iii) achieve compliance yourself generally, the approach taken by regulatory authorities to prevent aml related risks is to impose "police obligations" on the regulated companies the companies must notably take measures to establish and verify the identity of their customers this process is known as kyc (know your customer) ; establish internal safeguards and have an aml officer the aml officer must follow some regular training; join a self regulatory organization (sro) these organizations, such as vqf , are recognized by the federal financial market supervisory authority (finma) and are obliged to supervise their members with regard to aml requirements best practices anti money laundering if the company is involved in money exchanges (e g , usd to chf) or in money flows (e g , payment provider services), compliance with anti money laundering rules is assessed and registration with a self regulatory organization (sro) is completed if necessary applicable sanctions are understood and complied with how do i get this done? in practice, determining when the amla applies, which measures must be taken, and how to join an sro is rather complicated and requires expert advice as compliance is key to the survival of the company and its success, it's paramount to seek expert support as early as possible book a free call to discuss how we can best support you read more on the lexr blog https //www lexr com/en ch/blog/aml sro application switzerland/ https //www lexr com/en ch/blog/aml sro application switzerland/