I Will Bring Along My Experience In Good Governance, Investigations, Risk Management And Compliance- Den ACCA Global Council Candidate
Today we present to you our interview with Mr. Den Surfraz ACCA Global Council candidate on financial crimes & anti - money laundering procedure .
Mr. Den Surfraz explain us brief about your background?
I am fellow member of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountant of England (ACCA) and a member of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE). I also hold a certificate in Sanctions Compliance with the Association of Certified Anti Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS) and hold a Diploma in Police Studies (Criminology and Policing) from University of Mauritius.
I am a member of the ACCA Mauritius Network Panel where I was the Vice President for the period 2013/2014. I served on various sub committees and chaired the CSR subcommittees for two consecutive years (2014 and 2015). I was also the 2nd Vice President of the Mauritius Institute of Professional Accountant (MIPA) where I chaired the subcommittees on Compliance and Ethics (2014/2015).
What is financial crime ?
Financial crime over the last 30 years has increasingly become of concern to governments throughout the world. This concern arises from a variety of issues because the impact of financial crime varies in different contexts. It is today widely recognised that the prevalence of economically motivated crime in many societies is a substantial threat to the development of economies and their stability.
It is possible to divide financial crime into two essentially different, although closely related, types of conduct.
First, there are those activities that dishonestly generate wealth for those engaged in the conduct in question. For example, the exploitation of insider information or the acquisition of another person’s property by deceit will invariably be done with the intention of securing a material benefit. Alternatively, a person may engage in deceit to secure material benefit for another.
Second, there are also financial crimes that do not involve the dishonest taking of a benefit, but that protect a benefit that has already been obtained or to facilitate the taking of such benefit. An example of such conduct is where someone attempts to launder criminal proceeds of another offence in order to place the proceeds beyond the reach of the law.
Those who commit Financial Crimes are:
- Organised criminals, including terrorist groups, are increasingly perpetrating large-scale frauds to fund their operations.
- Corrupt heads of state may use their position and powers to loot the coffers of their (often impoverished) countries.
- Business leaders or senior executives manipulate or misreport financial data in order to misrepresent a company’s true financial position.
- Employees from the most senior to the most junior steal company funds and other assets.
- From outside the company, fraud can be perpetrated by a customer, supplier, contractor or by a person with no connection to the organisation.
- Increasingly, the external fraudster is colluding with an employee to achieve bigger and better results more easily.
- Finally, the successful individual criminal, serial or opportunist fraudsters in possession of their proceeds are a further group of people who have committed financial crime.
Financial crime is commonly considered as covering the following offences
- fraud
- electronic crime
- money laundering
- terrorist financing
- bribery and corruption
- market abuse and insider dealing
- information security
What is the difference between a normal theft and a financial crime ?
As compared to financial crimes, a normal theft is the misappropriation of goods/article belonging to another. The venue to commit this crime may be anywhere. However, if the proceeds from theft are being laundered through the financial system, then this will amount to money laundering which is under the category of financial crimes.
Why it is difficult to prove financial crime beyond reasonable doubt?
The latest Accounting Fraud scandal involved Tesco and this multinational could pay a fine of “well in excess” of GBP 100Mn to prosecutors for the failings leading to its 2014 accounting scandal. While financial crimes may involve huge fines (HSBC, Deutsche Bank, etc), it is however difficult to prove them beyond reasonable grounds if the evidences have not been collected and handled properly and if the case is not well presented by the prosecution. A good example is the cases against Prabhat Goyal, the former chief financial officer of Network Associates (2010) who was prosecuted for 15 counts of financial crimes offences.
What are the basic steps of solving a financial crime ?
The basic steps in solving/investigating a financial crime offence are:
- Planning of the assignment/investigation - Initial Meeting with the Attorney, Document Inventory and Requests; Storage of the Documents and developing the Examination Plan
- Performing the background investigations- Common Asset Hiding Techniques,Sources of Information Public Records.
- Examining the relevant documents- Financial Statements,Bank Records & Income Tax Returns.
- Interviewing witnesses, information sources, and the subject.
- Analyzing the facts.
- Preparing the report of findings
Mr. Den you have years of experience as Money Laundering Reporting Officer. How challenging is your role ?
Professionally, I am the Senior Compliance Manager of Barak Fund Management, a fund manager with offices in Mauritius, South Africa, London and Cayman Islands. Before joining Barak Fund, I was the Global KYC(Know Your Customer/AML(Anti Money Laundering) and Operations Control Manager of Citco Corporate and Trust, a multinational. I was responsible to look after the business side of the Risk and KYC/AML framework within the Citco C&T division globally.
I have also worked as an Investigator with the Financial Intelligence Unit of Mauritius for more than three years and was a police officer posted at the Anti-Drug and Smuggling Unit for more than 10 years.
Mr, Den If you are Select as a ACCA Global Council member what is your plan towards improving money laundering reporting procedures and war over financial crime ?
If I am elected at the council, I will bring along my experience in Good Governance, Investigations, Risk management and Compliance. I will ensure sure that the correct frameworks are in place to regulate the conduct of ACCA members so that they perform with high integrity, honesty and be always transparent in their duties and dealings.
Interviewed by
Pasan Malinda katipearachchi
Chief Editor
Business Tomorrow
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