Strict controls on money transfers prevent money laundering when sent to Mexico, the report says.

A report released in March claimed that more than $4.4 billion sent to Mexico could be part of organized crime money laundering, but a recent analysis rules out that possibility given strict control over transactions carried out by immigrants.

“If we calculate an average of $400 per shipment, the $4.4 billion figure would mean 11 million irregular shipments, a figure that is impossible to observe given the controls in place,” said Jesús Cervantes, director of economic statistics at CEMLA and the Monetary Forum. transfers from Latin America and the Caribbean.

The expert draws attention to supervision to which money transfer transactions are subjected.

“All financial transactions can be vulnerable to money laundering, but for this reason there is control; maybe even in remittances are higher than in the general case of financial transactions”, he said in an analysis published in News IMEF magazine in Mexico. “In fact, when sending money transfers, some may find controls excessive: sending can go through up to four or five filters. In a money order sent to Mexico, let’s say, from New York may involve a money transfer company, a Mexican bank, and a payer, which may be a supermarket chain.

Cervantes constantly analyzes and reports on money transfers sent from the US not only to Mexico, but also to several countries in Latin America, so he rules out that small amounts sent by immigrants to their families are part of money laundering.

“For $400 monthly deliveries… it would take 917,000 accomplices on both sides of the border,” he said, pointing to a demonstration that more $4 billion is ‘under suspicion’. “The criterion of one remittance per month is questionable as there is survey data that shows that, on average, a Mexican host family receives more than one remittance per month.”

Cervantes pointed out that those who make these reports, such as the organization Signos Vitales, are not experienced in tracking shipping transactions from the United States, and it is easy for them to confuse transactions.

“The Vital Signs article highlights the case of shipments from Minnesota, which, according to statistics, is already the third state in North America in terms of total shipments. There are money transfer companies that have a server (or their server) in Minnesota, and one of them is an important money transfer company,” explains Cervantes.

That is, Minnesota serves as a triangulator of money in the US financial system, and not because the shipment took place from there.

“When processing information, the North American country of origin of the money transfer is not taken into account, and Banxico reports that it was sent from Minnesota. This has been known for many years, but Sinhos Vitales does not know this, ”Cervantes notes. “In terms of receiving remittances, this problem exists mainly with the figures for Mexico City, Tijuana and Monterrey. For example, in Mexico City, money transfers are accepted and paid out from people who live in neighboring states, and there are accounts registered in Mexico City, but the recipient of the money transfer is in the province.”