Developers, realtors offered AML seminar

| 21/06/2021 | 18 Comments
Cayman News Service
Paul Byles

(CNS): A number of financial service experts have created an anti-money laundering (AML) seminar designed for people in real estate and development to help them understand the risks and vulnerabilities of their sector and the need for them, just like financial institutions, to know their clients. The question of the property sector’s vulnerability to financial crime is an issue of concern.

In the face of runaway development on Grand Cayman, there appears to be a significant amount of real estate sales to overseas investors before projects are completed or without these buyers ever seeing the property they are investing in. As a result, alarm bells have been ringing about whether developers and real estate agents here are able to cope with the complex compliance required.

Paul Byles, Director of FTS, who has worked in the compliance and risk management sector for the past 15 years, will be joined by the Department of Commerce and Investment’s head of Compliance and Enforcement, Claudia Brady, as well as lawyers Huw Moses and Linda DaCosta from HSM to present the workshop.

“Real estate compliance encompasses every aspect of a property transactions and the regulations are evolving each year,” said Byles. ‘It’s everyone’s responsibility to keep up with the laws that govern dealing in real estate whether you are an agent, owner/broker, banker, attorney or other staff member handling the transactions.”

Speaking to CNS recently Victoria Templeman, who heads the Cayman Islands Bureau of Financial Investigations (CIBFI), said that Cayman’s development community is a weak link in the local anti-money laundering regime, and outreach to this sector is part of the plan to cut that risk.

The DCI is now responsible for ensuring that the real estate sector is compliant, and Brady said she will be offering insight into the way the industry is regulated to assist realtors and developers with their day to day risk management.

“The DCI is continuously finding ways to better educate all its licensees on best practice measures to assist them in managing risks in the real estate sector and we are looking forward to the opportunity to do so at this seminar,” Brady said.

See more details here.


Share your vote!


How do you feel after reading this?
  • Fascinated
  • Happy
  • Sad
  • Angry
  • Bored
  • Afraid
Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Tags: , , , , ,

Category: Business, Construction, Crime, Crime Prevention, Real Estate

Comments (18)

Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed

  1. Anonymous says:

    …Know your customers. BS as it relates to Real Estate. Money, money, and more money are the criteria. Nothing more nothing less. Heck with them caring where it is coming from and whether or not the small man or woman will ever be able to own a piece of their own country.

  2. Anonymous says:

    Let’s see how much developers have allergies to accountability.

  3. Anonymous says:

    But who trains DCI?

  4. Anonymous says:

    Government, the land belong to the people it shouldn’t be sold to investors. Stop the destruction ASAP. Each citizen should own their own home and land to plant fruit bearing trees. The birds are looking at me, asking me, what I am doing? The humans need more, I guess.

    • Anonymous says:

      The birds(parrots) are destroying my crop. If I can’t farm for a living as a result, I will simply cut down the trees and build some ghetto apartments.

      • Anonymous says:

        We should learn to co-exist with nature. All the creatures were put on this earth for a purpose.

  5. Gray Matter says:

    Just a farce … money rules and laws don’t, he who has the Gold rules… throw the law a Lillie fish and the Big fish get away.
    Trust me.

  6. Max says:

    When and where – can we attend electronically?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.