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Jens Weidmann: What role should central banks play in combating climate change?

05 February 2021
Knowledge Base

Dr. Jens Weidmann, President of the Deutsche Bundesbank and Chair of the Board of Directors of the Bank for International Settlements, recently gave a speech at the ILF Online-Conference on “Green Banking and Green Central Banking: What are the right concepts?” at the Goethe University Frankfurt on 25 January 2021. Ladies and gentlemen, I would have been only too happy to meet you all in person. Even more so, as from my office it would only have been a short walk to the campus of the Goethe University. And allow me the following side remark: There can hardly be a better person to name a university after than Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Goethe combined many disciplines and subjects, and not just as a poet, dramatist, novelist and critic. He also conducted research in various natural sciences, studying minerals, plants, human anatomy and meteorology, to name a few. And let’s not forget that he reflected on the nature of money, even serving as finance minister in the Duchy of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, a small, former state in what is now Thuringia. Goethe seems to be a true all-rounder, able to turn his hand to any number of things. Continue reading…

Personal data breach mismanagement and the Twitter case

03 February 2021

by František Nonnemann

Twitter International Company (TIC), part of the Twitter Group, was fined 450.000 EUR by the Irish data protection authority for insufficient data breach management. The Irish Data Protection Commission found that TIC did not report significant data breach in the time limit of 72 hours as stated by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Furthermore, the company did not have the process for data breach management under full control and did not keep appropriate records of all data breaches that occurred. Continue reading…

How the Ashton Whiteley Scam grew and impacted the victims

01 February 2021
Knowledge Base

by Dina-Perla Portnaar

The Ashton Whiteley Scam illustrates how financial crime really works. Not a lot of personal cases were shared with the public before in order to make financial crime tangible. Here is an outline of the events given by one of the many victims of the Ashton Whiteley Scam that took place a couple of years ago. The man shared his story with me, which we will share in a couple of articles. Here is part two. Continue reading…

Key learnings from the virtual AML & FinCrime Tech Forum

30 January 2021
Knowledge Base

Mirela Ciobanu & Dina-Perla Portnaar

Almost everyone agrees that 2020 has been a rough year. However, 2021 has not smoothed some of its roughness. Most of us continue working from home, having to balance family life with professional activities, dealing with a high degree of anxiety due to uncertainty of what is going to happen next. However, being able to take part in virtual events has helped us to stray in touch with our peers, to maintain a high level of engagement with our industries and to learn more about the topics that we are interested in – in this case how to fight financial crime and find the right business partner to assist your deal with financial crime from a compliance perspective.
Continue reading…

World’s most dangerous malware EMOTET disrupted through global action

29 January 2021
Knowledge Base

Law enforcement and judicial authorities worldwide have recently disrupted one of the most significant botnets of the past decade: EMOTET. Investigators have now taken control of its infrastructure in an international coordinated action. This operation is the result of a collaborative effort between authorities in the Netherlands, Germany, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Lithuania, Canada and Ukraine, with international activity coordinated by Europol and Eurojust. This operation was carried out in the framework of the European Multidisciplinary Platform Against Criminal Threats (EMPACT). Continue reading…

FSB examines financial stability implications of climate change

28 January 2021

The Financial Stability Board (FSB) recently published a report that examines the potential implications of climate change for financial stability. The report analyses how climate-related risks might be transmitted across, and might be amplified by, the financial system, including across borders. It also sets out next steps for the FSB’s work in this area. Current central estimates of the impact of physical risks on asset prices appear relatively contained but may be subject to considerable tail risk. The manifestation of physical risks could lead to a sharp fall in asset prices and increase in uncertainty. A disorderly transition to a low carbon economy could also have a destabilising effect on the financial system. Continue reading…

Coronavirus: Commission proposes update to coordinated approach on free movement restrictions

27 January 2021

The Commission recently proposed an update to the Council Recommendation of last October coordinating measures affecting free movement in the European Union. This is part of the Commission’s ongoing efforts to ensure better coordination and communication of travel-related measures at EU level. In light of new coronavirus variants and high numbers of new infections across many Member States, it is necessary to strongly discourage non-essential travel, while avoiding border closures or blanket travel bans and ensuring that the functioning of the Single Market and supply chains remain uninterrupted. Therefore, further targeted action to ensure a coordinated approach on measures restricting free movement within the EU is necessary. Continue reading…

Antitrust: Commission fines Valve and five publishers of PC video games € 7.8 million for “geo-blocking” practices

26 January 2021
Knowledge Base

The European Commission has fined Valve, owner of the online PC gaming platform “Steam”, and the five publishers Bandai Namco, Capcom, Focus Home, Koch Media and ZeniMax € 7.8 million for breaching EU antitrust rules. Valve and the publishers restricted cross-border sales of certain PC video games on the basis of the geographical location of users within the European Economic Area (‘EEA’), entering into, the so called “geo-blocking” practices. The fines for the publishers, totalling over €6 million, were reduced due to the companies’ cooperation with the Commission. Valve chose not to cooperate with the Commission and was fined over €1.6 million.
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Lieve Lowet

Lieve Lowet

EU Affairs consultant and lobbyist

Le Brexit Nouveau est arrivé

25 January 2021
Knowledge Base

On Christmas Eve 2020, the EU and the UK agreed on the long debated Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA). It goes beyond a free trade agreement. It has been provisionally applicable since 1 January 2021. It is a horizontal agreement, 400 plus pages, with more than 1000 pages of annexes. The provisional application will cease upon ratification or on 28 February 2021. The negotiated text of the TCA, published in the Official Journal of 31 December 2020, has not yet been subject to final legal-linguistic revision. The authentic and definitive texts resulting from such revision will replace ab initio, the signed versions of the TCA. These authentic and definitive texts of the TCA will be published in the Official Journal of the European Union in due time by 30 April 2021. But in the meantime, there it is! Le Brexit Nouveau est arrivé. Continue reading…

Institutionalized failure: The trials of Gabriel Fernandez

22 January 2021
Knowledge Base

by Dina-Perla Portnaar

Risk, governance and compliance in the financial sector remain our flagship. Banking and finance has been part of our DNA for many years. The publisher of the Risk & Compliance Platform Europe, Michel Klompmaker, used to be the publisher of a title – literally – called Banking & Finance. On top of that, the Risk & Compliance Platform Europe has a community of excellent relations with many leaders, top decision makers, professionals and regulators in the financial world. Also, in the past sixteen years, the domains in which I worked the most have been IT/tech and finance. With that said, some of our readers aren’t aware of the fact that the Risk & Compliance Platform Europe has a global community in all sorts of verticals. It focuses on risk and integrity in a broader sense – healthcare, export, logistics, customs, property and housing associations, entrepreneurship, government, managing consulting, social, society and so on and so forth. The field of risk and integrity opens up discussions on behaviour within a variety of private and public institutions and on an individual and collective level. The Risk & Compliance Platform Europe is not just about the business world. Continue reading…