On July 22, 2019, the joint agencies issued a statement to improve transparency of risk-focused BSA/AML supervision. The statement outlines common practices for assessing a bank's money laundering/terrorist financing risk profile, assisting examiners in scoping and planning the examination and initially evaluating the adequacy of the BSA/AML compliance program. Using this approach, the agencies generally are able to allocate more resources to higher-risk areas and fewer resources to lower-risk areas when conducting BSA/AML examinations. The statement does not establish new requirements, and also notes that having a risk-based compliance program enables a bank to allocate compliance resources commensurate with its risk.
The FDIC’s version of the full statement can be found here.
