Notes from the desk.
Short pieces on the casework behind the game — typologies, judgement calls, and the alerts that look like something and turn out to be nothing.
Tuning a transaction monitoring rule without breaking it
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How to write a business-wide risk assessment that survives review
How to build an AML business-wide risk assessment with visible reasoning, real controls evidence and residual risk that is derived rather than asserted.
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Authorised push payment fraud: victim or mule?
How to tell a money mule from a fraud victim on the receiving account: age, prior activity, outbound speed, inbound spread, and the customer conversation.
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Reading a blockchain trace without over-reading it
How to read a blockchain analytics trace in compliance work: what the tool knows, what it infers, and how to write it up honestly.
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Sanctions screening: how to clear a partial name match
How to clear a sanctions name match properly: the discriminators that resolve a hit, what a defensible discounting rationale contains, and the errors to avoid.
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Structuring: what it actually looks like on a statement
How deposit structuring actually appears in account data, the tells that separate it from ordinary cash takings, and the three questions that resolve most cases.
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Breaking into financial crime compliance without a banking background
What hiring managers screen for at analyst level, which certifications pay for themselves, and the realistic entry routes into financial crime compliance.
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Reading a corporate ownership structure to find the beneficial owner
How to trace a beneficial owner through a five-layer ownership chain by hand, where percentage thresholds mislead, and when to record UBO undetermined.
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What an EDD file should actually contain
What a complete enhanced due diligence file holds: source of wealth versus funds, evidence standards, ownership chains, adverse media and sign-off.
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