Washington goes after the plumbing.

OFAC designated the A7 Network, led by the sanctioned and convicted fraudster Ilan Shor, as a significant transnational criminal organisation; its SDN entry lists Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria and Zimbabwe. Treasury says A7 handled more than 7.5 trillion roubles ($91.5bn) by January 2026, and FinCEN found its Sub-Agents processed over $17bn between January 2025 and June 2026. FinCEN proposed a rule to prohibit transmittals of funds involving A7 Sub-Agents and issued a red-flag alert.

OFAC published new Cuba sanctions regulations implementing Executive Order 14404, effective 30 September. US banks may no longer process U-turn transfers in which Cuba or a Cuban national has an interest, may not open or maintain accounts for Cuban private-sector entrepreneurs, and must block existing ones and report them to OFAC. Dealings with entities on the Cuba Restricted List are prohibited; General License 1 still covers family remittances, food and medicine.

On 28 September the Council of the EU listed 10 individuals and 17 entities over the deportation of Ukrainian children, including Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov, the Moscow City Tourism Committee and a children's camp in North Korea. On 1 October the UK designated 20 individuals, one entity and 10 ships under its Russia regime, including the LNG carriers Aleksey Kosygin and Konstantin Posiet and Novatek Gas and Power Asia Pte Ltd.

Switzerland's FINMA concluded enforcement proceedings against Julius Bär, finding serious breaches of risk-management and anti-money laundering obligations, including in its private-debt business and in relationships with clients linked to Russian politically exposed persons. FINMA ordered the confiscation of about CHF 10 million in profits, a temporary ban on new relationships with PEPs from high-risk countries, a CHF 250 million capital add-on and reporting to FINMA until 2032. The ruling is not yet legally binding.

The SFC reprimanded and fined Zheng Da International Financial Holding HK$7 million for AML/CFT failures between December 2021 and September 2023, and suspended responsible officer Zhong Hao for seven months. The firm did no due diligence on customer-supplied trading systems used by 160 clients, could not evidence enquiries into deposits in eight accounts, and missed 176 cases of the same client placing matching buy and sell orders in the same second at the same price.

Fraudsters impersonating senior executives took €95 million from Fideuram, Intesa Sanpaolo's private-banking arm, Reuters reported, citing two sources. Its then-chairman received a WhatsApp message appearing to come from Intesa's CEO, followed by a call using an AI-cloned voice of a law-firm partner. Transfers went mainly to accounts in China and Hong Kong. About €53 million was recovered; €36 million was converted into crypto and is untraced. Intesa and Fideuram declined to comment.

The SEC charged the Cryptoaiml and TSAI entities over frauds totalling at least $15 million that drew investors through WhatsApp groups, fake AI trading signals or bot rentals, and counterfeit SEC certificates. In Lagos, the Federal High Court ordered the final forfeiture of 431 phones from a facility known as "HK" where, according to the EFCC, Nigerian youths and foreign nationals were trained to run romance, investment and crypto fraud against victims in the US, Canada, Mexico and Europe.

The EFCC and the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit opened a three-day stocktake of Nigeria's readiness for its FATF mutual evaluation in 2027, less than a year after the country left the grey list in October 2025. Officials said assessors will test effectiveness, not just laws: use of financial intelligence, risk-based investigations, prosecutions and asset recovery. EFCC Chairman Ola Olukoyede called a return to the grey list "unimaginable".