Accuity Helps Leading Banks in Pakistan Stay Ahead of Global Regulatory Requirements

Financial crime compliance solutions ensure that local banks can fight AML/CFT threats in real-time and better support economic growth

 

ISLAMABAD,
PAKISTAN / SINGAPORE – Media
OutReach – 7 July 2020 – Accuity, the leading
provider of financial crime screening, payment services, and counterparty
know-your-customer (KYC) solutions, today announced how leading banks across Pakistan,
including HabibMetro
Bank, Sindh Bank Limited, and Askari Bank Limited, are using Accuity solutions to
meet ever increasing regulatory requirements. Having supported more than 40% of
Pakistan’s banking and financial services institutions over the past decade, Accuity continues
to work closely to enhance the sector’s ability to meet their local and international
Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Countering Financing of
Terrorism (CFT) obligations.

Pakistan has been making progress in meeting the Financial Action Task Force
(FATF) 27-point compliance requirements. By meeting this global standard,
Pakistan aims to strengthen its fight against money laundering and terrorist
financing and at the same time boost its economy by positioning itself as a
regional financial and exports hub.

“Accuity has helped
contribute to the efforts of the Pakistan government and State Bank of Pakistan
to establish a strong system to combat money laundering and terrorist
financing,” said Bharath Vellore, Managing Director, Asia Pacific, Accuity.
“With our best-in-class financial crime screening and compliance solutions, our
customers in Pakistan across banking, microfinance and insurance are
confidently offering financial products and services to meet the levels of
compliance required by global, regional and local regulators  They are now in a better position to accelerate
cross-border trade volumes, enable remittances from its large diaspora, drive
financial inclusion, and provide small and medium enterprise credit.”

Establishing Global Banking Relationships to Serve the World’s Seventh Largest
Diaspora

HabibMetro
Bank is a subsidiary of Habib Bank AG Zurich (HBZ) — a Swiss multinational
bank with operations in nine countries. Due to its international presence and
multiple correspondent banking relations, HabibMetro must perform due diligence
on its correspondent banks in a timely manner, as per the guidelines from FATF
and the Wolfsberg Group.

To do so,
HabibMetro uses the Bankers Almanac solution from Accuity, including
the Due Diligence module, to conduct KYC due diligence
checks when increasing its correspondent banking footprint in other
geographies. Bankers
Almanac provides a single and consistent source of truth for information on
over 21,500 banks, providing supporting documentation for due diligence checks,
and allowing the Bank to more effectively manage its financial counterparty KYC
and mitigate any associated risks.

“Bankers Almanac helps HabibMetro to comprehensively manage our periodic financial counterparty
reviews and onboard new financial counterparties more efficiently, with the
click of a button,” said Farooq Ahsanuddin, Head of Financial Institutions
& Remittances at Habib Metropolitan Bank. “These
capabilities allow us to increase the productivity of our financial services
team and streamline our banking operations, while delivering unparalleled
service to our customers worldwide.”

Real Time Screening
Capabilities to Meet Compliance Mandates and Drive Financial Inclusion

Sindh Bank Limited is a government-owned
Pakistani scheduled bank with 330 branches in 169 cities nationwide. To
effectively manage its AML and CFT compliance checks, identify politically
exposed persons (PEP), and deter proscribed persons from engaging in illicit
financial activities, the bank adopted Firco
Compliance Link and Firco
Global WatchList^® solutions to demonstrate enhanced screening
capabilities and processes to local regulators. It is also using Bankers Almanac to provide
supporting documentation for due diligence checks.

“The bank’s ability
to have a consolidated
view of all accounts and transactions activities, conduct on-going and
automated screening, coupled with comprehensive audit trails to the regulators,
is fundamental
in ensuring that our branch network both meets compliance mandates and
promotes economic development,” said Mr. Imran Samad, President and CEO of
Sindh Bank Limited. “We have chosen to partner with Accuity for its
sophisticated, intelligent and automated approach, speeding up operations and
improving our services to our valued customers. This in turn gives us more
capacity to innovate and help drive financial inclusion.”

Setting Strong
Controls on Exports with an Advanced Trade Compliance Solution

Askari Bank Limited is
a commercial and retail bank in Pakistan that implemented Firco Compliance Link
in 2018 to manage risks related to trade-based money laundering and terrorist
financing. This solution brings together proprietary data, on-ground
intelligence, and regulatory compliance expertise that allows the bank to
centralize its screening processes against trade transactions involving
sanctioned individuals, entities, vessels, ports,
and dual-use and controlled goods
(DUG).

“By offering an
enterprise-wide, single screening solution, Accuity is covering seven different
applications of the bank that are mostly integrated for the purpose of
performing real-time screening for accounts, payments and trade transactions.
Accuity is able to meet all our compliance and business requirements, thereby
safeguarding the bank from any regulatory or reputational risks,” said Mr.
Ali Raza Zaidi, Chief Compliance Officer, Askari Bank
Limited. “This allows Askari Bank Limited
to maintain our position as the local standard bearer in proactively meeting
the highest trade compliance requirements, while ensuring innovation.”

More information
on the Accuity portfolio of financial crime screening and payment services solutions
can be found here: https://accuity.com/what-we-do/overview

About Accuity:

Accuity offers a suite
of innovative solutions for payments and compliance professionals, from
comprehensive data and software that manage risk and compliance, to flexible
tools that optimise payments pathways. With deep expertise and industry-leading
data-enabled solutions from the Fircosoft, Bankers Almanac and NRS brands, the
Accuity portfolio delivers protection for individual and organisational
reputations.

Part of RELX,
a global provider of information and analytics for professional and business
customers across industries, Accuity has been delivering solutions to banks and
businesses worldwide for 180 years.