On 30 April 2021 several amendments1 to the Law no. 129/2019 on the prevention and combating of money laundering and terrorism financing (the “AML Law”) have entered into force.
The main amendments to the AML Law include:
• the obligation to submit the statement on the beneficial owners on an annual basis has been reinstated: such statement has to be submitted within 15 days from the approval of the yearly financial statements and within 15 days from the occurrence of any modification of the beneficial owners’ identification data;
• legal entities set up of shareholders that are natural persons are no longer exempted from the obligation to submit the statement on the beneficial owners;
• the cases in which the reporting entities have to submit a report for suspicious transactions to the National Office for Prevention and Control of Money Laundering (the “AML Office”) are limited to situations in which they know, suspect or have reasonable grounds to suspect that: a) the goods derive from criminal conduct or are related to terrorist financing or b) the information that the reporting entity holds may be used to enforce the provisions of the AML Law;
• new sanctions in case of certain misdemeanors committed by financial institutions supervised by the Financial Supervisory Authority: a) warning or fine ranging from RON 10,000 to RON 23,000,000, in the case of natural persons; b) warning or fine from RON 10,000 to RON 23,000,000 or up to 10% of the total annual turnover, calculated on the basis of the latest available financial statements approved by the management body, in the case of legal entities;
• the criminal law provisions of the AML Law shall also apply to money laundering offences committed by a Romanian citizen or by a Romanian legal entity outside Romania, even if the deed is not deemed a criminal offence by the criminal law provisions of the country where such deed was committed.
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[1] The amendments are set out in (i) Law no. 101/2021 for the approval of Government Emergency Ordinance no. 111/2020 amending and supplementing the AML Law, as well as amending and supplementing certain enactments, supplementing art. 218 of the Government Emergency Ordinance no. 99/2006 on credit institutions and capital adequacy, amending and supplementing Law no. 207/2015 on the Tax Procedure Code, as well as supplementing art. 12 para. (5) of Law no. 237/2015 on the authorization and supervision of the insurance and reinsurance activity and (ii) Law no. 102/2021 supplementing art. 49 of the AML Law, as well as amending and supplementing certain enactments which were published in the Official Gazette of Romania, Part I, no. 446/27 April 2021.
