As a part of the Technical Support Instrument (TSI) initiative for Portugal “Developing a risk-based methodology for an automatic anti-money laundering/counter terrorist financing risk categorisation for supervised entities in Portugal”, the Council of Europe Economic Crime and Cooperation Division (ECCD) is currently supporting Banco de Portugal (BdP) in their efforts to improve their risk-based approach to supervision.
As a first stage within this process, the ECCD has undertaken the development of a Technical Paper (TP) containing a review of the outcomes of current anti-money laundering and countering terrorist financing (AML/CFT) supervisory activities conducted by the BdP. The review analysed the effectiveness of prioritisation and selection of entities for supervisory engagement, as well as at mapped all relevant data that could feed into the BdP’s risk-based supervision methodology. In addition, it allowed the identification of areas for further improvement regarding the current data inputs for the BdP’s risk-based supervision model and provided recommendations intended to strengthen and build upon the current supervisory practices and approach which are presently in place.
The main findings and recommendations of the review were presented to BdP representatives during a workshop which took place in person on 6 April 2022 in Lisbon, Portugal. The event provided an opportunity to discuss how to build on the results of this initial analysis and further support the Portuguese authorities in enhancing the risk-based supervision of the financial sector.
As a follow-up, the project will undertake an in-depth review of Banco de Portugal’s risk-based supervision model.
The event was organised within the framework of the Technical Support Instrument project“Developing a risk-based methodology for an automatic anti-money laundering/counter terrorist financing risk categorisation for supervised entities in Portugal”, funded by the European Commission’s Directorate General for Structural Reform Support (DG REFORM) and the Council of Europe and implemented by the Council of Europe.