Economic Warfare & Trade Policy Sanctions
The Financial Action Task Force, the global standard-setter against money laundering and terrorist financing, adopted a new evaluation of the U.S. anti-money-laundering system at its October plenary in Paris, the U.S. Treasury Department said on Friday, Nov. 6. The plenary also kept Iran on the FATF blacklist and agreed to a targeted review of countries with large crypto sectors, according to Treasury and the FATF.
Related: U.S. Offers Up to $20 Million for Tips on Iran’s Nuclear Program.
What the FATF decided
Delegates from more than 200 jurisdictions and observers met in Paris from Oct. 28 to 30, the first plenary under the U.K. presidency of Giles Thomson, the FATF said. The plenary adopted the mutual evaluation reports of the United States and Mexico, according to the FATF.
The FATF removed Bulgaria, Côte d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Monaco from its grey list of jurisdictions under increased monitoring. It said Vietnam had made too little progress and that it would consider next steps if Vietnam does not improve by the next plenary.
Treasury’s statement was headlined “FATF Recognizes Effectiveness of U.S. AML/CFT System.” The FATF’s outcomes summary said the U.S. report had been adopted; the ratings themselves were not part of the summary reviewed by The Boston Report.
Iran stays on the blacklist
Iran remains on the FATF blacklist, Treasury said. The FATF updated its public statement calling on Iran to criminalize terrorist financing and to set up a targeted financial sanctions regime in line with FATF standards.
According to Treasury, the FATF also reminded all jurisdictions to impose countermeasures on Iran that restrict correspondent banking, digital asset transactions and business relationships.
Crypto and scam compounds
The plenary agreed to launch a targeted review of jurisdictions with large virtual-asset sectors, with results due in June and October 2027, the FATF said. It also approved a report on the illicit financial flows behind scam compounds, which the FATF called among the fastest-growing forms of organized crime.
What happens next
The FATF said the scam-compound report would be published after the plenary and would inform its wider work on fraud. More sanctions coverage is on the Economic Warfare Dashboard.
Sources
- U.S. Department of the Treasury: FATF Recognizes Effectiveness of U.S. AML/CFT System, Advances Key Illicit Finance Initiatives
- Financial Action Task Force: Outcomes FATF Plenary, 28-30 October 2026
Read next in Sanctions & Financial Warfare
Most read this week
- Abdul El-Sayed and the Muslim Brotherhood Claims: What’s Confirmed and What Isn’t
- Stock Futures Erase a 2.4% Overnight Drop as Markets Digest Democrats’ Sweep of Congress
- Spain Transport Minister Óscar Puente Quits 26 Days Before Election Over Crash That Killed 69
- GM Korea’s Sales Jump 26.6% on Chevrolet Exports as Hyundai Slips 6.3% and Korean Factory Growth Cools
- Boston Plans to Close 3 Schools in 2028 as Enrollment Drops as Much as 58%
Latest
- Pentagon Awards $1.6 Billion in Contracts, Led by $1 Billion for Emergency Response
- NASA Spotlights De Gerlache-Kocher Massif, a Former Artemis Landing Candidate
- CISA Flags Actively Exploited SonicWall VPN Flaw, CVE-2026-19868
- Secret Service and Air Force Test Drone Interceptors at MacDill in Counter-UAS Drill
- 7,000 Troops Begin Simulated Combat in Hawaii as French Forces Join Army Drill