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▶ Video account attention cross-border navigation In recent years, the country has been stepping up its crackdown on money laundering, an illegal and criminal activity. Cross-border trade, as an important money laundering channel for criminals, has also been included in the key regulatory areas.
Some time ago, many sellers' personal bank cards were frozen due to receiving cross-border foreign exchange settlement. The root cause behind this was mainly due to the public security department's efforts to crack down on cross-border money laundering and strengthen compliance monitoring of cross-border transaction settlements. At present, cross-border money laundering cases occur frequently, and criminals transfer stolen money by taking advantage of cross-border trade and registering foreign local companies. Recently, foreign media revealed that domestic criminals registered a large number of shell companies in the UK to launder money. The takeaway shop became the headquarters of 719 companies, and a cross-border money laundering den was uncovered! A total of 761 companies have been registered by domestic criminals in a shabby flat above a takeaway in Somerset over the past year, a Mail on Sunday investigation has revealed . ▲ The picture comes from the Internet The investigation found that these criminals registered an average of more than 30 new companies on the local government's Companies House website every day, and most of the companies were registered at only 18 specific addresses. In fact, the owners had no connection with these companies, and their residences were registered as the headquarters of newly established Chinese companies without their knowledge. ▲ The picture comes from the external network What makes business owners even more angry is that it takes weeks to delete a fake company, while registering one takes less than 15 minutes, costs only £15, and does not require proof of address, passport or driving license. The fraudsters are suspected of registering more than 11,000 new companies in the UK using a system called "soft touch" that helps anyone set up a new business without proof of identity. ▲ The picture comes from the external network Once a local company is successfully registered in the UK, the scammers use it to obtain an online bank account to transfer illegal funds. The UK National Crime Agency revealed that these companies are essentially shell companies with no employees and no transactions, but instead transfer assets on behalf of individuals or other companies. It is reported that criminals take advantage of the local relaxed system and transfer hundreds of billions of pounds of stolen and illegal funds in the UK every year through shell companies to avoid high domestic taxes and currency controls. It can be seen that cross-border money laundering is becoming more and more rampant, and these "nests" exposed by foreign media are just the tip of the iceberg. Therefore, the measures of relevant national departments are also continuously strengthened, and action plans are formulated and card-cutting activities are carried out one after another. Cross-border trade is a key part of the crackdown, and sellers have also become the focus of "observation". Nine public security bureaus jointly "sanctioned", cross-border trade became a key area for anti-money laundering! In January this year, multiple national departments jointly launched the "Three-Year Action Plan to Combat Money Laundering Crime (2022-2024)" , and decided to carry out a three-year action to combat money laundering crimes across the country from January 2022 to December 2024. The launch of this action plan also marks another upgrade of anti-money laundering supervision. Not long ago, the public security authorities launched a new round of card-cutting activities, and many cross-border sellers reported that their personal bank cards had been frozen. Since it is common for sellers in the cross-border circle to use personal accounts for cross-border foreign exchange settlement, people in the circle were panicked for a while, fearing that large-scale freezing incidents would occur or even account cancellation. A seller reported that his bank card was frozen by nine public security bureaus in Guangdong, Henan, Guizhou, etc., involving 160,000 yuan. The seller said that according to the five transaction records in the card, it might be because his friend used the card to sell US dollars and receive transfers, so he was judged to be suspected of telecommunications fraud. ▲ The picture comes from the seller communication group Last year, many foreign trade merchants in Yiwu had their cards frozen on a large scale. In addition, many sellers’ personal cards have been blocked for no reason recently, and rumors are rife that personal cards cannot receive any cross-border payments. However, this statement has also been refuted by professionals. The country has not uniformly restricted the foreign trade settlement of personal bank cards. As long as compliant transactions are conducted on the basis of compliance with regulatory laws and regulations, even if the card is frozen, it can be successfully unblocked by providing relevant supporting documents. Of course, cross-border trade still faces huge risks such as illegal money laundering and criminal fraud. Because it involves huge domestic and overseas capital flows and the source of funds is extremely complex, it is difficult to identify the identities of both sellers and the authenticity of the transaction, so it is often used by criminals as a way to launder money. Moreover, many small and medium-sized enterprises lack awareness of tax compliance, and are therefore taken advantage of by criminals, passively becoming accomplices in money laundering crimes. We would also like to remind all sellers that with the rampant cross-border money laundering and the escalation of national supervision, strengthening financial and tax compliance management is a top priority.
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