Electronic Trade and Money Laundering :: Economics

electronic Trade and Money LaunderingELECTRONIC TRADE FEATURES AND EXPECTATIONSElectronic trade is a reality that reveals and promises both rapid andexponential growth. Its unbroken progress, as well as increasinginnovation in electronic payments, has for long been the subject ofwide attention, especially for regulatory bodies, in complaisance of theopportunities for money laundering that these unseasoned instruments bearprovide, and of the responses that regulatory systems can and essentialdevelop in their regard. Detailed reports on the wholesaleimplementation of the naked as a jaybird payment systems argon available from the Bankfor International Settlements. These reports show that, with greator lesser speed, such systems are taking on a global dimension.Innovation continues incessantly and rumours spread every day closelythe development of newer instruments, residing even in the mostfamiliar tools such as mobile telephones.Aside from unpredictable shocking events, which could thwart theadvance and approachability of technological resources, electronic tradeis eventually likely to become the norm, at least in the most advancedcountries. It provide spread everywhere all trades, just as other instruments cars, household appliances, telephones have ferment before, becauseit is equally effective, cheap, and within everybodys reach. The mainfactors still inhibiting widespread diffusion are security risks such as problems of transparency and symmetry of information a needfor defence from intrusive technologies a call for guarantees againstthreats deriving from fraud, embezzlement, counterfeiting, fictionalidentities and privacy.These risks are likely to be scaled down, as the diffusion of the newinstruments enlarges the market in such a way as to make lawfulbehaviour thoroughly prevail which in turn will make the marketitself more reliable. Under such conditions, obstacles and constraintsthat interfere with market development will not be able to resist its inward pressure, or will turn into discriminations and losses incommercial competition, which is positively unwelcome for theeconomies involved. It is certainly not by chance that in this egressthe governments of many countries have so far shown a wait and seeattitude.NEW INSTRUMENTS AND capital LAUNDERING RISKSIn its broadest sense, money laundering includes whatever activity is capable to disguise the source of illicitly earned wealth, dissolving thetracks that can conk back to it. To this goal, whatever means theeconomic and financial system can supply is beneficial.Experience has shown that money launderers prefer environmentsfeatured with poor control, last risks that justify high losses and pull aheads, multiplier effects, little transparency and therefore asymmetricinformation, ease of manipulation, chance of connivance or illicitprofit sharing. In this perspective, the internet is an idealenvironment. The access to new technologies is more effective, and at