CHINESE MONEY LAUNDERERS THREATEN U.S. BANKS FROM CANADA, HAVING BECOME RESIDENTS DUE TO THEIR SAINT KITTS CBI PASSPORTS, WHICH CONFER VISA-FREE ENTRY AS A MEMBER STATE OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF NATIONS

While we are on the subject of the threats American financial institutions face from Chinese career criminals, compliance officers must be alert as well, regarding those who having purchased Saint Kitts and Nevis economic citizenships in China, use them to relocate to Canada, first posing as students, and then becoming property owners who will then obtain residency. They use their SKN passports, being from a Commonwealth of Nations Member State, to gain easy access, and given Canada's national policy of encouraging immigration, and its weak record on AML/CFT, are then free to engage in money laundering, with little fear of detection or arrest. Their activities, which frequently target American victims, and often impact US financial institutions, directly or indirectly, are rarely detected in real-time in American banks.

Therefore, frontline compliance officers at U.S. banks, that are engaged in transaction monitoring, may want to take more than a low-risk attitude towards substantial incoming or outgoing wires involving Canada, especially originating in British Columbia or Ontario; you may end up uncovering more than a casual, legitimate transfer. Stay alert; there are a lot of dodgy Caribbean CBI passport holders in Canada, who, purchased their passports in China, and who have never been to the country of which their passport shows them to be citizens.