The Laundry

To mark the summer season, we're bringing you some of our favourite episodes from The Laundry archives.

In this episode, originally published in November 2022, Marit Rødevand is joined by Viveka Strangert, former Chief Compliance Officer at Swedbank, to discuss: how a naive compliance culture opened the doors for money-laundering

In 2020, Viveka was known as the "whistleblower" in a massive money laundering scandal which saw Swedbank fined 4 billion SEK (€389.8m) by Sweden's financial watchdog for severe deficiencies in its AML processes and for withholding information from authorities investigating its role in the scandal.

This season of The Laundry has shown that financial crime touches every aspect of society and life.

We’ve been joined by Chief Compliance Officers, MLROs, Heads of AML, data scientists, consultants, journalists, government officials, presidents, and football club directors - sharing stories of combating dirty money, terror financing, fraud, and corruption.

In this episode, our expert hosts, Marit Rødevand and Fredrik Riiser, are bringing you 11 big lessons on financial crime.

We're bringing you some of the best lessons from this season of the podcast, including: insights on growing fin...

A new player has entered the game in the fight against financial crime.

The Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Authority (AMLA) is the new entity aiming to transform AML and CFT supervision in the EU.

AMLA is gearing up to take on the 70% of criminal networks in the EU that use money laundering to fund their activities and conceal their assets.

Will this be the knock-out blow for these criminal gangs?

Our expert host, Fredrik Riiser, is joined by the European Commission's Chiara Bacchi...

The Financial Action Task Force is hugely influential in combatting money laundering and terror financing. 

Their 'black' and 'gray' lists are powerful tools in shutting out bad actors from the world economy but also incentivising countries to fight corruption and dark money in their own systems. 

But what does it feel like to be at the top of an organisation impacting financial regulations, policies, and living standards for people across the world?

Our expert host, Marit Rødevand, is joined by T. Raja Kumar, President of the Financial Action Task For...

Running the entire compliance operations of a financial institution is no walk in the park. 

Managing a team working to keep customers safe, managing expectations of CEOs and founders, keeping across regulation and sanctions – while trying to stay ahead of criminals looking to funnel dirty money through your service.

Our expert host, Marit Rødevand, is joined by Mitch Trehan, Chief Compliance Officer at Allica Bank, to ask: what does it really take to be a chief compliance officer?

The pair discuss: how the role looks today, the challenges that caus...

Synthetic data comes with all sorts of hype: the next great accelerator to combat financial crime, the silver bullet of compliance – even an emerging hero!

But while this use of AI is promising, there is still plenty to be worked out and you better believe that the bad guys are utilising it too!

Our expert host, Fredrik Riiser, is joined by Dr. Janet Bastiman, Chief Data Scientist at Napier AI, to strip through the hype and look at what synthetic data can really do for compliance professionals.

The pair discuss: the...

The most dramatic criminal actions can often be hidden behind the dullest of language.

'VAT Refunds’ is unlikely to have your pulse racing – but hidden within this is a financial loophole taking money from the European Union and putting directly into the hands of drug traffickers, terrorists, and criminal gangs. 

Our expert host, Marit Rødevand,  is joined by Jerker Asplund, Deputy Chief Prosecutor of Ekobrottsmyndigheten (Sweden's financial crime authority) to talk about the VAT loophole which is being used to attack the state.

The pair discuss: the rise of this spe...

Technology has drastically changed nearly every aspect our lives – but has it all been for the better?

In this episode, we are spelling out the complex relationship between money laundering and organised crime – and how technology is the ‘rocket booster’ underneath it all.

Our expert host, Marit Rødevand is joined by investigative journalist and author, Geoff White, to discuss his new book: Rinsed: From Cartels to Crypto: How the Tech Industry Washes Money for the World's Deadliest Crooks.

The pair talk about Geoff's work in finding fascinating stories of criminals ex...

Live on stage at VENUE81 in Stockholm, Sweden!

AI is powerful tool in combatting financial crime and its impact can no longer be ignored. But where do we draw the line between a human professional with vast industry knowledge, and an AI fed the exact same information?

What nuances can a human detect that a language learning model might miss? Can AI truly interpret and deduce?

In the latest episode of The Laundry – our expert host, Marit Rødevand is joined live on-stage by governance, compliance and AML expert, Viveka Stra...

What could link oligarchs and FATF grey-list countries to the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund?

The Government Pension Fund of Norway, known more commonly as the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund, was established as a way to invest the country’s surplus revenues from its oil and gas sector. 

To date, the fund has reportedly put money into more than 8,500 companies in 65 countries around the world and is the largest sovereign wealth fund on the planet! 

But what happens when you take a public list of those declared investments and put th...