Thread by @jeuasommenulle

Obviously, I need time to digest the huge amount of data , but here’s a preliminary view on an extremely important topic. (Sorry if you don't like it.)

https://twitter.com/ICIJorg/status/1307726268943790083

As a citizen or even an investor, I’m obviously appalled by some banks’ past or present behaviours. Anyone who’s read some of my AML threads on Deutsche, Swedbank or others, knows that. But I don’t think what ICIJ does is a good thing.

First, it’s too much at the same time. We’re swamped with information. The general public ends up not being able to make the difference between an investment in an offshore fund and laundering the money of a drug cartel. It’s all “dirty bank stuff”. And that’s terribly bad.

Even for law enforcement; what do you do with all this? It’s mixing truly criminal behaviour and normal financial stuff which you may not like, but is perfectly legal. The way everything is shown will not help you find your way in the quagmire.

As a result, there are very few consequences for the people involved (even the banks). I mean, Panama Papers and then what? Sure, the PM of Iceland had to resign, but that was basically it.

Compare and contrast with what a thorough and dedicated investigation can produce, such as @FD and others' work on Wirecard or @BondHack and @cynthiao on H20?

This new reporting is arguably even worse because they’re basically using SARs, which are “Suspicious Activity Reports” the authorities already have. How does making the content of those public (even if they’re not directly published) help fight crime?

Unless you make the assumption that there is gigantic cover-up in the US government, this is simply unhelpful. Imagine you’re the lawyer for one of the suspects, you’ve just been given a slam dunk to show any jury will be biased or to know what the authorities are focused on.

There is a reason why it’s a crime to publish FinCen’s work – and that reason is not to help cover-ups.

So we’ll all probably enjoy a bit of bank bashing for a few weeks, and even put some media pressure on some banks (for stories that are sometimes more than 15 years old…), but I’m afraid it won’t actually achieve much.

The truth is, money laundering is extremely difficult to fight and the solution is a complicated mix of creating the right incentives, better technology, a more efficient governance (especially in the EU.), more investor pressure, etc

The media can and does help, of course, but I really believe it is by focusing on the worst cases, with dedicated and deep investigations on a specific story. This is what, for example, some papers have done in Denmark or Sweden

More public resources are also probably required – and it won't cost anyhting because it’s actually a very lucrative area of government! The fines can be huge!

So at the end of the day, I understand ICIJ has obviously good intentions, but you should always remember: this topic is complex, and the solutions are not always as simple as downloading 10gb of data on a server - even if it all sounds very exciting for a few weeks.