Serious Tax Crimes Designated Money Laundering Predicate Offences

With effect from 1 July 2013, the offences of tax evasion and serious fraudulent tax evasion under the Income Tax Act, and the offences of tax evasion and improperly obtaining refunds under the Goods and Services Tax Act have been designated as money-laundering predicate offences.

This action is part of a slew of measures Singapore is taking to strengthen its framework for international tax cooperation to combat cross-border tax offences.  The Monetary Authority of Singapore ("MAS") had earlier announced this change in a consultation paper titled "Designation of Tax Crimes as Money Laundering Predicate Offences in Singapore" issued in October 2012. MAS had also proposed to implement a regulatory framework for financial institutions to apply existing anti-money laundering ("AML") measures such as know-your client checks, transactional monitoring and other control measures to identify money laundering of proceeds from serious tax crimes.

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