It has been found that activities related to financial crimes including money laundering have increased significantly in Nepal. The annual report of the financial year 2080/81 published by the Financial Intelligence Unit-FIU Nepal on Sunday showed that the complaints of suspicious transactions in Nepal last year increased by 24 percent compared to the previous year.

Experts say that despite the reduction in the number of reporting threshold transaction reports (TTR) that must be done by concerned agencies in the FIU during this period, the increase in complaints of suspicious transactions also confirms the increase in activities related to financial crimes. They say that due to the problems of good governance in all areas of the country, along with the increase in economic activities, complaints related to financial crimes may also increase. According to the

report, 5 thousand 335 suspicious transactions (Suspicious Transaction Reporting - STR and Suspicious Activity Reporting - SAR) were received in the financial year 2079/80. By the financial year 2080/81, this number has increased to 7,338.

According to the report, the highest number of complaints received by FIU was 84.23 percent from commercial banks, 7 percent from development banks, 3 percent from finance companies, 2.45 percent from payment system operators, and 2.46 percent from remittance companies.

Even though there is an increase in complaints of suspicious transactions from insurance companies, securities trading companies and others, the number of such complaints from the cooperative sector has not increased significantly. Only 8 complaints were received in 2080/81 from the distressed cooperative sector.

"The increase in reporting by banks and financial institutions to the Financial Information Unit naturally confirms the increase in financial crime-related activities," said Vasudev Bhattarai, head of the Financial Information Unit, "even as the level of awareness in the regulatory scope and financial service providers increases, complaints of suspicious transactions also increase. But we should not forget the fact that financial crime has also increased.'

He said that since the informal economy is expanding rapidly in Nepal, there has also been an increase in complaints of suspicious transactions from banks and financial institutions.

It is mentioned in the annual report of FIU that due to the overall increase in economic activity, improvement in the complaint mechanism, increase in regulatory capacity and scope, the implementation of GoAML, a system that allows complaints to be filed online.

Among the complaints received in the last financial year, 3,417 were related to money laundering, 2,498 were related to crimes including tax evasion, 2,498 were related to currency banking and finance, 927 were related to fraud, 681 were related to farms and partner businesses, 428 were related to casino and gambling, and the rest were related to various other areas. 

Financial crime activities will naturally increase with the increase in financial transactions, but FIU says that it cannot be said that financial transactions have increased based on the number of complaints received. A Rashtra Bank official said that as economic activity increases, crime or suspicion of it will naturally increase.

"Incidents of financial crimes in the society have not only increased now, but have been happening since the past, now the complaints of such crimes may have increased due to increased literacy in the relevant agencies," said the official.

The law requires showing the source of all transactions over 1 million. Therefore, if there is any suspicion of financial crime in such transactions, a complaint should be filed with the Financial Information Unit. Such a complaint is called a Threshold Transaction Report (TTR). In the

report, it appears that the TTR has decreased in the last financial year compared to the previous year. The report also shows that such complaints have been decreasing in recent years. FIU claims that the decrease in TTR is due to changes in the complaint system. According to the report, about 1.697 thousand 712 TTRs have been received by FIU in the last financial year. 

In the financial year 2079/80, there were 16 lakh 98 thousand 398 such complaints. Compared to the previous year, FIU head Bhattarai said that the TTR decreased due to the increase in electronic banking transactions, decrease in cash transactions, increase in the participation of companies in GoAML, and decrease in large transactions in the stock market. The total number of analyzed in 2080/81 has increased to 1,632. Of these, 889 reports have been sent to law enforcement agencies and regulatory agencies, the report says The second General Assembly meeting of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) held in Paris, France on February 9, decided to place Nepal in the 'grey list'. To Nepal 

has been kept on the 'grey list' for the next two years. Countries involved in this will be monitored more and those countries should make an action plan with a commitment to improve within the specified time. According to their performance, how long the monitoring will be will be decided. Accordingly, Nepal has made a 2-year action plan and committed to fully implement it.