Vatican State, more preventive measures to curb money laundering

Preventive measures to curb money laundering in the Vatican State are growing. These include the monitoring of information in the Central Registry to identify natural and legal persons related to entities professionally engaged in financial activity, as well as the mapping of 196 entries with cash worth EUR 10,000 or more. These are some of the measures put in place by the Vatican's financial supervision and information authority, the Asif, to combat crimes such as money laundering and terrorist financing.

Thanks also to these interventions, in 2025 in the Vatican, the alert remained low: according to the annual Asif report, the risk of terrorist financing was low and medium that of money laundering. The number of suspicious activity reports, 78 in twelve months, increased compared to the previous year, but from 2021 onwards there is a slightly declining trend. This can be explained by considering two elements: on the one hand, the increased sophistication of the processes by which the competent authority reports cases, and on the other, a different classification of certain transactions. In the past, in fact, the link with states considered to be at high risk of money laundering or terrorist financing triggered the alarm, whereas today there is a specific category.

In 2025, the majority of reports concerned transactions, executed or pending, with indications of potential money laundering. These transactions were often characterised by high complexity, illogicality or lacked economic justification. In many cases, they were also unrelated to the nature of the relationship between the subjects or the historical activity or stated objectives. Among those under special surveillance, transactions to or from abroad and those carried out with cash are the most frequent, while the most affected jurisdictions are in Europe. Seventy-three times the warning light came on for activities with high-risk countries, but in 71 cases the Asif then authorised the suspended transaction as a precautionary measure. Compared to 2023 and 2024, the increase was significant, but is explained by the increase in links with Myanmar, due to a seismic event that aggravated the humanitarian crisis already affecting the country.

In 2025, the number of alerts received by Asif from foreign states increased, while the twenty alerts sent represents the lowest number since 2021.