On June 30th, 2021, the U.S. Department of the Treasury released a set of national priorities in a document titled ‘Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism National Priorities.’ These priorities are aligned with the 2018 and 2020 National Strategy for Combating Terrorist and Other Illicit Financing. The document dictates areas in which financial institutions should focus their resources to ensure compliance and security. Priorities within the document include:

• Corruption
• Cybercrime
• Both foreign and domestic terrorist financing
• Fraud
• Transnational criminal organization activity
• Drug trafficking organization activity
• Human trafficking and human smuggling
• Proliferation financing

Each of these priorities is explained in detail within the document on FinCEN’s website. You can access it here: This document is led by The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a relatively small component of the Treasury Department that was tasked with leading these security efforts and writing regulations to protect national security. Legislation passed by Congress required FinCEN to develop its national strategy for countering money laundering and terrorism financing. They will also need to release a new document stating priorities every four years. Regulations stemming from the disclosed priorities likely won’t be issued for quite a while. The agency has 180 days after priority publication to disclose regulations, as described under the new anti-money-laundering law. They have two years to make those regulations go into effect. Given the complexity and breadth of the subject matter, many experts anticipate there will be extensions. Banks and other non-bank financial institutions received further guidance on the practical application of the priorities to their organizations in the preparation for the regulations. While there is much support for the initiative, many have expressed concern for the increased regulatory burden. As these regulations become available, RiskWatch will work to incorporate them into our available content libraries, simplifying the compliance process for all relevant organizations.