ACAMS Wrap-up

In some cases, what happens in Vegas is just too good to keep in Vegas. Here are some highlights from ACAMS 15^th Annual AML and Financial Crime Conference.

From September 26-28, risk and compliance officers and other professionals packed this important industry event to learn about anti-money laundering; risk management strategies; innovative technology solutions; regulatory and law enforcement news; and other hot topics in the world of fighting financial crime.  2500 attendees came from a wide array of industries, including: financial institutions, casinos, accounting firms, insurance companies, law enforcement and regulatory agencies, law firms, technology providers, universities and other organizations. 

Agenda Highlights

Here are some of the Attivio team’s favorite sessions:

• Personality Liability: What Compliance Officers Need to Know – ACAMS moneylaundering.com Editor-in-Chief and a panel of industry experts reviewed recent cases to document personal liability risks and appropriate AML oversight actions, differentiating personal and institutional liability to identify regulatory scenarios where legal interests may conflict.
• U.S. Currency Comptroller Key Note Address -- Thomas J. Curry, Comptroller of the Currency, spoke to ACAMS about his office’s strategies for re-evaluating AML risk.
• Special Q&A with a Reporter from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists  – Reporter Ryan Chittum discussed the Panama Papers that revealed a wealth of information about banks and the use of shell companies registered in secrecy havens.

Attivio ACAMS Presence

• The Money Booth – After watching a demo of the Attivio Anti-Money Laundering Investigator and learning how they could save time and money with our solution, hundreds of attendees lined up to take a turn in the money booth to win cash and raffle tickets.

• I had the pleasure of presenting Achieving Compliance Efficiencies Amid Heightened Regulatory Scrutiny. Attendees questions about non-compliance penalties confirmed what we’ve been hearing from customers about the challenges of keeping up with regulatory changes and how important it is to reduce false positives and speed up the time it takes to resolve investigations into suspicious financial activity.

We also had significant conversations about a variety of hot topics, including: the blockchain technology behind bitcoin and how regulations aren’t keeping up with the technological advances; criminals using prepaid cards to launder money; and the importance of creating an open investigative environment with the financial services version of fusion centers. 

Did you attend ACAMS? What were your key takeaways?