FEBRUARY 11, 2017
The Philippines is pushing ahead with plans to tighten anti-money laundering (AML) controls in its casino sector.
The country’s casinos, which are lightly regulated by state-run operator-regulator PAGCOR, are currently exempt from the rules of its Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2001.
But the cyber heist on the Federal Reserve Bank of February last year, drew the relaxed nature of the Philippine system to the world’s attention and severely embarrassed the country, leading to urgent calls for change not just from lawmakers inside the Philippines but also from the World Bank.
