Financial crime compliance in the Middle East transformed by digital solutions reveals Deloitte regulatory conference
October 22, 2019 - Deloitte, the leading professional services firm, recently hosted the fourth edition of its Regulatory and Financial Crime Conference (RFCC) in Dubai. The annual forum serves as a platform that brings together leading figures from the global financial services industry to discuss the latest in financial regulation and crime in the Middle East region.
This year’s conference programme attracted over 200 practitioners, regulators, and business and key opinion leaders, to debate a diverse range of topics and exchange valuable industry insight.
The event also featured a distinguished line-up of speakers, including Bob Contri, Global Financial Services Industry Leader at Deloitte; Bryan Stirewalt, Chief Executive, Dubai Financial Services Authority; Rebecca Kelly, Partner, Morgan Lewis and Claiborne Porter, Partner, Squire Patton Boggs.
Commenting on the event, Neil Hargreaves, Deloitte Forensic Middle East Leader, said: “Embracing disruptive technology and fostering closer collaboration between financial institutions, regulators and the public sector will be crucial as the region continues to upscale its financial crime compliance and regulatory supervision. Fostering information sharing and a culture of cooperation is at the very heart of Deloitte’s RFCC, which continues to play a substantial role in supporting the region’s business community as it navigates contemporary financial crime challenges.”
Digital disruption and its role in driving change in financial crime compliance was one of the hot topics during the financial sector gathering. Panelists and speakers emphasized that technologies, such as big data, are driving major changes in financial crime compliance. This includes neutralization of Know Your Customer efforts and improvements in cost and competitiveness. Attendees also discussed how tackling financial crime is fundamentally becoming an industry-wide challenge, which depends on financial institutions working together on effective and efficient solutions in a resource-constrained world.
The forum’s expert panels and speaker presentations also highlighted the preparedness of the industry to leverage data and AI to effectively tackle contemporary financial crime challenges, and extraterritorial financial crime enforcement by U.S. prosecutors and regulators. There was a debate on post FATF mutual assessment considerations for the UAE financial services industry and broadly for the region, based on the increased emphasis on financial crime compliance monitoring and supervision by the local regulators.
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