"In order to effectively prevent crime, it is not enough if only the private sector closes the money laundering channels, but criminals must be held accountable both by convicting them and confiscating their assets. Over the past couple of years the riskiest sector has been the virtual asset service providers. We have significantly invested our resources to manage the risks and been able to downscale not only the risk, but also the number of service providers. We now stand at 49 valid licenses. Moreover, we have made 760 disclosures to the law enforcement authorities and have received permission to transfer more than one million euros to state revenues. As a result of our work, almost 10 million euros have been seized in criminal proceedings," said Matis Mäeker, head of the Financial Intelligence Unit.
"At the Financial Intelligence Unit, we have increased the ability to prevent terrorist financing. A real example of this is the case where, thanks to the vigilance of the virtual currency service provider, we identified an 18-member network of terrorist financiers in cooperation with the Internal Security Service. The discovery also led to the freezing of the funds of a terrorist organization on the EU sanctions list," added Matis Mäeker.
The Financial Intelligence Unit is an autonomous and independent institution under the administration of the Ministry of Finance, and its activities are financed from the state budget. "The data of the Financial Intelligence Unit show that international criminals are constantly looking for opportunities to operate in a small country like Estonia. The changes in the legal environment aimed at preventing money laundering and terrorist financing and the empowerment of the Financial Intelligence Unit show that these steps have been correct, and we cannot make concessions here in the future either," said Minister of Finance Mart Võrklaev.
In 2023, the Financial Intelligence Unit received 12,500 reports. The assets in the amount of 3.85 million euros were restricted for one year with the permission of the court. Ten injunctions were issued to transfer nearly 1.36 million euros to the state. As of the end of the year, approximately 9.2 million euros had been seized by the courts, which had been initially discovered and restricted by the Financial Intelligence Unit. As of 31.12.2023, the Financial Intelligence Unit had frozen 33 million euros on the basis of a financial sanction. 150 market participants gave up or lost their operating licenses during last year. Nearly 5,000 people were reached in 2023 with training and information events.
