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Evaluation Report on Austria’s Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Measures

Overall Assessment

Austria has a strong legal and institutional framework for combating money laundering (ML) and terrorist financing (TF). However, improvements are needed in national AML/CFT policy coordination, risk assessment, and targeted financial sanctions.

Effectiveness

Substantial Results

Austria achieves substantial results in:

• Investigating and prosecuting persons who finance terrorism
• Implementing targeted financial sanctions related to predicate offenses
• International cooperation

Moderate Results

Austria sees moderate results in:

• Understanding risks
• Transparency of legal persons and arrangements
• Confiscation
• Targeted financial sanctions related to TF

Assessment of Risks

Austria has a mixed understanding of its ML/TF risks, with each competent authority having its own concept of risks based on practical experience. There is no holistic picture of the country’s ML/TF risks, and national AML/CFT policies are not developed or implemented in a coordinated manner.

Financial Intelligence

Current State

The Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) functions well as a predicate offense and associated ML investigation unit but does not conduct strategic analysis to support competent authorities. The FIU’s analytical capabilities are limited by IT and human resources constraints, and legal constraints prevent it from conducting comprehensive operational analysis. The FIU’s database is outdated, and it does not enable cross-matching or data-mining of suspicious transaction reports (STRs).

Confiscation

Prosecutors do not see STRs and the results of their analysis by the A-FIU as a valuable source of information for investigations.

Conclusion

Overall, Austria needs to improve its risk assessment, policy coordination, targeted financial sanctions, and financial intelligence capabilities to effectively combat money laundering and terrorist financing.