Article 1 Establishment and scope of action

The Authority for Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (‘the Authority’) is hereby established.

The Authority shall act within the powers conferred on it by this Regulation, in particular those set out in Article 6, and within the scope of Regulation (EU) 2023/1113, Directive (EU) 2024/1640 and Regulation (EU) 2024/1624, as well as all directives, regulations and decisions based on those acts, of any further legally binding Union act which confers tasks on the Authority, and of national legislation transposing Directive (EU) 2024/1640, and other directives conferring tasks on supervisory authoritiesmeans a supervisor who is a public body, or the public authority overseeing self-regulatory bodies in their performance of supervisory functions pursuant to Article 37 of Directive (EU) 2024/1640, or AMLA when acting as a supervisor;.

1. preventing the use of the Union’s financial system for the purposes of money launderingmeans the conduct set out in Article 3, paragraphs 1 and 5, of Directive (EU) 2018/1673 including aiding and abetting, inciting and attempting to commit that conduct, whether the activities which generated the property to be laundered were carried out on the territory of a Member State or on that of a third country; knowledge, intent or purpose required as an element of that conduct may be inferred from objective factual circumstances; and terrorist financingmeans the conduct set out in Article 11 of Directive (EU) 2017/541 including aiding and abetting, inciting and attempting to commit that conduct, whether carried out on the territory of a Member State or on that of a third country; knowledge, intent or purpose required as an element of that conduct may be inferred from objective factual circumstances; (‘ML/TF’);

2. contributing to the identification and assessment of ML/TF risks and threats across the internal market, as well as risks and threats originating from outside the Union that impact, or have the potential to impact, the internal market;

3. ensuring high-quality supervision in the area of anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (‘AML/CFT’) across the internal market;

4. contributing to supervisory convergence in the area of AML/CFT across the internal market;

5. contributing to the harmonisation of practices in the detection of suspicious transactions or activities by Financial Intelligence Units (‘FIUs’);

6. supporting and coordinating the exchange of information between FIUs, and between FIUs and other competent authoritiesmeans:a Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU);a supervisory authority;a public authority that has the function of investigating or prosecuting money laundering, its predicate offences or terrorist financing, or that has the function of tracing, seizing or freezing and confiscating criminal assets;a public authority with designated responsibilities for combating money laundering or terrorist financing;.