Abstract:

Money laundering ("ML") crimes started getting world-wide recognition in the 1980s, especially, within a drug trafficking context. Governments started becoming aware of the huge profits generated from such criminal activities and this created the impetus for governments to come up with anti-money laundering mechanisms to stop criminals enjoying their illicit gains. In the yesteryears, money laundering was strictly associated with financial transactions that happened in organized crime but nowadays money laundering activities have expanded into various other spheres. This trend has to be curtailed or else this phenomenon will envelop almost every area that requires financial transactions. Hence, the authors are of the opinion that this article is timely as it highlights the methods of ML and explains the various typologies of ML. It is hoped that this article will help governments, legislators, enforcement officers, legal practitioners and academics to further understand how ML operates in the various typologies so that these parties are better able to identify and combat them with stronger regulation and enforcement measures.