The Hungarian Supervisory Authority today issued its new revised recommendation on the implementation of anti-money laundering rules for financial institutions. This recommendation replaces the former one issued last August.

The present guidance covers not only anti-money laundering rules but appropriate measures to detect and stop terrorist financing. The new set of recommendations involve the recent Basel Committee proposals on due diligence of banks. Finally, the guidelines are taking into consideration the new Hungarian law on anti-money laundering adopted by the Parliament last year.

It is expected that the Hungarian Financial Supervisory Authority's new recommendation contributes to the effective implementation of anti-money laundering rules and regulations in the financial sector. The reporting activity of the financial intermediary participants has already improved substantially since last summer.

The new law on anti-money laundering adopted by the Hungarian Parliament last November prohibits the opening of new anonymous deposits as from December 19, 2001. At the same time it also envisaged a transformation process of former anonymous deposits into registered ones. On the basis of the figures of January and February, the transformation process is under way with a reasonable pace. In the first two months of 2002 some 158 billion HUF deposits, that is 35% of the overall stock, were transformed into registered deposits after proper identification of the owners. The transformation process during this period involved 730 thousands deposits.

The new anti-money laundering law and relevant secondary regulations together with their effective implementation