The Council of Europe’s oversight body Moneyval has ruled that Bulgaria’s re-enforced anti-money laundering (AML) rules comply with international standards, iGaming Business reported May 28.
The beefed up rules include more stringent oversight over Bulgaria’s gaming industry. They come two years after Moneyval called out the Eastern European nation and put it on its compliance enhancing procedures to win back AML approval.
Moneyval is the permanent monitoring body of the Council of Europe, an international body that works to uphold human rights, democracy and the rule of law.
It found that out of 40 Financial Action Task Force (FATF) recommendations, Bulgaria now fully or partially complies with 13 and is partially compliant with the remainder.
It is most compliant with the gambling and casino sector and real estate and legal services sectors.
In 2023, Bulgaria created the National Revenue Agency (NRA) and gave it the authority to create a new AML unit to oversee gaming. It will enforce customer verification, document collection and assessing money laundering and terrorist financial risks. It will monitor operations and investigate transactions flagged as suspicious.
Moneyval issued this statement: “Since the adoption of its mutual evaluation report in May 2022, Bulgaria has taken numerous steps to strengthen its anti-money laundering and combatting terrorist financing systems.”
