Tookitaki announced a partnership with Hakrinbank, a leading South American bank based in Suriname, to fortify its Anti-Money Laundering (AML) detection and alerts management capabilities.
To improve its legacy system and augment its ability to better detect, prioritise, investigate, report and prevent financial crime, Hakrinbank chose Tookitaki to deploy the RegTech’s cutting-edge Anti-Money Laundering Suite (AMLS) offering into production, harnessing the bank’s unique mix of customer, account and transaction data.
In the past, the alert handling at the Hakrinbank was mainly manual because of the number of false positives(alerts that do not represent suspicious activity). The bank wanted a system that could reduce the alert volume while not increasing the risk of missing any suspicious activity. Tookitaki was selected after demonstrating superior suspicious AML pattern detection using a modern solution architecture that can replace the bank’s existing systems over time and provide a migration path for future Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) capabilities.
Tookitaki’s Anti-Money Laundering Suite (AMLS) is an award-winning, end-to-end, machine learning solution with modules around transaction monitoring and names screening. This solution complements current legacy systems, reduces false alerts, and detects ‘missed’ suspicious cases, augmenting both the efficiency and effectiveness of AML compliance processes. The solution will help Hakrinbank prioritize alerts smartly, use AI to increase detection accuracy and improve investigation efficiency through an easy-to-manage user interface.
Mr Abhishek Chatterjee, Founder & CEO, Tookitaki, said, “Tookitaki continues to be a trusted partner of global banks to develop sustainable compliance programmes. Working with Hakrinbank provides us inroads into the Caribbean’s dynamic financial services market. It is a great opportunity for us to detect new and emerging financial crimes, help mitigate compliance risks and ensure banks and financial institutions are aligned to regulatory compliance requirements.”
“This strategic investment and partnership with Tookitaki will enable us to lead the transformation of better risk management by shifting from conventional rules-based AML practices to a future-proof, fully-automated AI-based AML approach. Hopefully through this journey, we are also able to alter the perception of the Caribbean region as high-risk. With increasing digital transactions, fighting money laundering has become more complicated than it previously was, but we are committed to tackling this menace through this partnership,” stated Mr. Rafiek Sheorajpanday, CEO of Hakrinbank.
Last year, the European Union blacklisted a handful of Caribbean jurisdictions due to inadequate AML and tax transparency practices. However, governments in the region and regulatory bodies such as the Financial Action Task Force of Latin America (GAFILAT) are working closely to take steps to tighten anti-money laundering regulations, while in parallel financial institutions are embracing AI to improve detection and investigation abilities. The region has introduced its own initiative, such as the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF) to improve governance.
Tookitaki AMLS is the industry's first AI-based enterprise AML analytics solution in production across transaction monitoring and screening processes with proven performance.
The Hakrinbank, founded 85 years ago, is a full-service bank that continually strives to operate in a customer-oriented way with a primary focus on the business segment and the middle- and higher-income consumer segment. The bank's ambition is to be the 'preferred bank' for our focus customer segments through a sublime customer experience. The Hakrinbank is strongly rooted in the Surinamese society and makes an important contribution to the development of various sectors, companies, families and society.
As one of the leading financial institutions in Suriname, Hakrinbank is working on their roadmap of providing digital and innovative products and services. Recently, the bank launched its e-commerce platform hoppa! and its mobile wallet Mopé. Currently, the bank is working on enhancements and new products and services such as a new Online and Mobile Banking platform.
Read More: AML Alert Management: How AI Can Augment Your Compliance Efficiency
When banks increase their digital and innovative products, it leads to an increase in cybersecurity and financial crime risks, which was one of the bank's greatest sources of threats. Preventing fraud and money laundering requires adequate measures. Hence, strengthening its enterprise risk management framework and also creating more risk awareness has a primary focus within the organization. In that regard, the bank has drawn up full-scale Cybersecurity, Fraud and ML/TF prevention programs. Aware of its leadership position in the financial sector in Suriname, the bank is committed to embracing the use of Artificial Intelligence to augment its AML/CFT capabilities and to lead the way in dealing with this threat to us and the country. The bank believes its partnership with Tookitaki will enable it to achieve these goals.
