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<p>The Office for Professional Body Anti-Money Laundering Supervision (OPBAS) became
operational in January 2018. OPBAS is part of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)
and supervises 22 professional body anti-money laundering (AML) supervisors which
oversee the legal and accountancy sectors, as listed in the Money Laundering Regulations
2017. Neither OPBAS, nor the professional body AML supervisors (PBSs) supervise AML
activities in the financial sector, which is instead supervised by the FCA. Fighting
financial crime is a key priority for the FCA.</p><p> </p><p>OPBAS’s key objectives
are to reduce the harm of money laundering and terrorist financing by:</p><ul><li><p>ensuring
a robust and consistently high standard of supervision by the PBSs overseeing the
legal and accountancy sectors;</p></li><li><p>facilitating collaboration, and information
and intelligence sharing between PBSs, statutory supervisors, and law enforcement
agencies.</p><p>The recent Financial Action Task Force (FATF) review of the UK’s AML
regime recommended that the UK should closely monitor the impact of OPBAS in undertaking
its work.</p><p> </p></li></ul><p>By the end of 2018, OPBAS will have completed its
initial supervisory assessments of all PBSs. The Government will continue to work
closely with OPBAS to ensure that its plans and activities are effective and risk-based.</p>
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