Money laundering is the process of transforming the proceeds of crime into ostensibly legitimate money or other assets. However, in a number of legal and regulatory systems, the term money laundering has become conflated with other forms of financial crime, and sometimes used more generally to include misuse of the financial system (involving things such as securities, digital currencies, credit cards, and traditional currency), including terrorism financing and evasion of international sanctions. This is a process whereby the origin of funds generated by illegal means is concealed (drug trafficking, fraud, gun smuggling, corruption, etc.)

1. Risks of Money Laundering

2. • What is Money Laundering?
Money laundering is the process of transforming the proceeds
of crime into ostensibly legitimate money or other assets. However, in a
number of legal and regulatory systems, the term money laundering has
become conflated with other forms of financial crime, and sometimes
used more generally to include misuse of the financial system
(involving things such as securities, digital currencies, credit cards, and
traditional currency), including terrorism financing and evasion
of international sanctions. This is a process whereby the origin of funds
generated by illegal means is concealed (drug trafficking, fraud, gun
smuggling, corruption, etc.)
• Process of Money Laundering:
1. Placement refers to the physical disposal of bulk cash proceeds derived
from illegal activity.
2. Layering is the movement of funds from institution to hide their origin.
3. Integration refers to the reinsertion of the laundered proceeds back
into the economy in such a way that they re-enter the financial system
as normal business funds

3. The Money Laundering Act
The legislation specifically relating to money laundering is
contained in the Money Laundering Prevention Act 2002 (Act No. 7
of 2002) the provisions of which supersedes whatever may contain
in any other Act in force in Bangladesh. So far as financial service
providers are concerned, the Act:
Defines the circumstances, which constitute the offence of money
laundering and provides penalties for the commission of the offence
(See Section 2 Tha of the Act) requires banks, financial institutions
and other institutions engaged in financial activities to retain correct
and full information used to identify their customers and
transaction records at least for five years after termination of
relationships with the customers and imposes an obligation on
banks, financial institutions and other institutions engaged in
financial activities and their employees to make a report to the
Bangladesh Bank where: - they suspect that a money laundering
offence has been or is being committed.

4. Working with the private sector
Since the end of the 1980s, most States with money
laundering legislation have instituted a system that
obliges financial organizations to report to the authorities
any transaction that may be concealing money laundering
activity. The fight against money laundering can therefore
be described as the ringing of a line of successive alarm
bells. The first is set off by the suspicious transaction
report. The alarm is communicated to the Financial
Intelligence Unit (FIU), which in turns rings a bell to warn
the public prosecutor and then the specialized police
department involved. If one of the bells fails, the job is not
done. Relations with the private sector are therefore based
on partnership.

5. Types of Money Laundering
Money laundering is a shifting reality that constantly adapts itself to its
circumstances. Very often, the police only detect new laundering schemes
when they have already been used by criminals. Leaving to one side the
instant or deferred consumption of dirty money that does not figure in the
laundering process, these schemes can be divided into three categories:
From the simple to the complex Take: the example of drug trafficking,
which rests on a family style organizational structure and invests its
income in real estate and commercial goods through non-trading real estate
companies, which provide the possibility to acquire and manage the real
estate.
1. International or local: Schemes may be international, using dummy
corporations, or they may be restricted to a local level, mainly in the case of
drug traffickers.
2. From amateurs to professionals: The Normandy château scheme clearly
required more than just money laundering skills and must have had
professional assistance. Two lawyers were investigated, having constructed
the entire legal structure for money laundering purposes. It should be
emphasized that the recycling of funds of dubious origin is increasingly
dealt with by professional money launderers who rent out their services to
criminal organizations anxious to clean dirty money quickly.

6. Effects of Money Laundering in Economy
• Economic Distortion and Instability
• Money laundering facilitates corruption and crime
• Loss of Control of Economic Policy
• Undermining the integrity of financial markets
• Risks to Privatization Efforts
• Reputation at stake
• Money Laundering distorts capital and trade flows
• Evasion of tax

7. How can we combat money laundering?
The mobilization of the international community and the
implementation of legal means to combat money laundering go
hand in hand with the reinforcement of the investigatory powers of
the police, the improved coordination of legal services and the
cooperation of financial institutions.
The laundering of dirty money plays a key role in a large
proportion of criminal activity which, according to international
experts, generates around 1,500 billion dollars per year. To
introduce these funds in the legal economy, the holders must
provide them with an appearance of legitimacy, subjecting the dirty
money to a whole series of transformations, with varying degrees of
complexity, most often using mechanisms and techniques to
facilitate the conclusion of the transactions, the circulation of clean
money and the smooth running of the economy.