Anti-Money Laundering Act citations in the Decisions of the Swiss Federal Supreme Court

An evaluation of citations of the Anti-Money Laundering Act (AMLA) of October 10 1997 (AMLA, SR 955.0) in the Decisions of the Swiss Federal Supreme Court (BGE) yielded interesting results. The ten standards in the AMLA that are cited most often are related to the obligations of financial intermediaries, the scope of application of the AMLA and supervision of financial intermediaries. The evaluation illustrates the application of AMLA standards by the Swiss Federal Supreme Court.

Citations of enactment articles from AMLA dating from 1999 to 2018 are found in 16 BGE. Seven of the ten articles that are cited most often concern the obligations of financial intermediaries. These obligations are the due diligence obligations of the financial intermediaries in general, such as identification of the contracting party (Art. 3), identification of the economic beneficiary (Art. 4), special due diligence obligations (Art. 6) and the obligation of documentation (Art. 7). They also relate to the obligations of financial intermediaries in the event of suspected money laundering (in particular Art. 9 and Art.10).