On the current operational activities of the SFMS

Since the beginning of the Russian military aggression, the State Financial Monitoring Service of Ukraine, as the financial intelligence unit of Ukraine, has focused its attention on taking measures to bring the terrorist country to international responsibility for its crimes against peaceful humanity, including money laundering, financing of terrorism and financing of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

We carry out all our activities in coordination with our national and international partners for the sake of a complete victory over the invader on all fighting lines, so that peace can return to our land as soon as possible.

In general, the SFMS is implementing a number of priority projects that will help to achieve certain goals.

1. Collection and processing of information

During the period from February 24, 2022 to March 18, 2022, the SFMS has received 39 849 reports from the reporting entities on financial transactions subject to financial monitoring, including:

- 820 suspicious financial transactions (activities) reports;

- 39 029 threshold transactions reports.

From the total amount of received reports:

- 17 072 reports on financial transactions made before February 24, 2022;

- 22 777 reports on financial transactions made after February 24, 2022.

Resolution of the Board of the National Bank of Ukraine of 24.02.2022 No. 18 “On the Operation of the Banking System under Martial Law” has introduced the restrictions on cross-border foreign currency payments outside Ukraine.

During the period from February 24, 2022 to March 18, 2022, the SFMS has received 3,499 reports on financial transactions for the transfer of funds abroad, conducted since February 24, 2022, and on a regular basis it carries out a thorough analysis of the mentioned transactions for compliance with applicable law.

2. Financial investigations

The SFMS takes practical measures to conduct state financial monitoring:

- analytical activities, exchange of information and cooperation with the Office of the Prosecutor General and other law enforcement and intelligence agencies are conducted. Channels for sabotage and reconnaissance groups financing are being identified as well as persons who may be involved in terrorism/separatism, and/or who publicly call for a change or overthrow of the constitutional order or a change of the territory or state border of Ukraine;

- in cooperation with law enforcement agencies, the financial transactions of persons involved in the financing of aggressive actions by the Russian Federation against Ukraine are suspended and referrals are transferred to the law enforcement system.

In particular, the results of joint work with the SSU have revealed the possible functioning of the scheme of financing the activities of pro-Russian structures and terrorist organizations, the so-called “DPR/LPR”. The SFMS has suspended funds in the equivalent of about UAH 83 million on 15 accounts of the Ukrainian business entity opened in 5 banking institutions.

3. Countering the use by Russia of cryptocurrency to circumvent restrictions:

Given the available information that in connection with the unprecedented sanctions against Russia, the aggressor country will begin to use cryptocurrency to circumvent the restrictions:

The SFMS together with the team of the Ministry of Digital Transformation, as well as key crypto experts of Ukraine have worked to identify a list of Russian crypto exchanges associated with sanctioned banks (Sberbank and others), in order to completely block their hosting. As a result of the work carried out, the SFMS has sent an appeal to the key American host company Cloudflare.

In addition, in close cooperation with crypto providers of Ukraine and world the mechanism for spontaneous blocking of crypto wallets in Russia has been launched. Also, other special actions have been taken to deter Russian aggression in the market of virtual assets.

4. The representative of the SFMS is a member of the operative group set up by the Office of the Prosecutor General to identify and seize assets belonging to persons who organize, ensure and provoke an aggressive war of Russia against Ukraine, both in Ukraine and abroad in order to transfer those assets to the state budget of Ukraine for the reconstruction of its destroyed infrastructure.

Ukrainians! Great people of the Great Country!

Let’s unite as hard as we can at this difficult time.

We will win.

Glory to Ukraine!