The Asia/Pacific Group on Money Laundering and the Financial Action Task Force have published their joint mutual evaluation report on Malaysia, concluding that the country has strengthened its anti-money laundering, counter-terrorist financing and counter-proliferation financing framework since 2015 through legal reforms, stronger supervision and better risk assessment and coordination. The report, adopted in October 2025 and based on an on-site assessment in February 2025, rates Malaysia as substantial for risk coordination, financial sector and virtual asset service provider supervision, financial intelligence, terrorist financing investigations, and terrorist financing and proliferation financing financial sanctions. Ratings are moderate for international cooperation, non-financial sector supervision, transparency and beneficial ownership, money laundering investigations and prosecutions, and asset recovery.
Asia/Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG)2025-12-11
Asia/Pacific Group on Money Laundering publishes Malaysia evaluation, finds stronger AML CFT framework but weak money laundering prosecutions
The Asia/Pacific Group on Money Laundering and the Financial Action Task Force published Malaysia’s mutual evaluation report, finding that the country has strengthened its AML/CFT/CPF system since 2015 through legal reforms, stronger supervision and better risk coordination. The report says Malaysia still struggles to turn money laundering investigations into prosecutions and convictions, while international cooperation, beneficial ownership transparency, non-financial sector supervision and broader asset recovery need improvement. Malaysia received substantial effectiveness ratings in several core areas, but only moderate ratings for international cooperation, beneficial ownership, money laundering enforcement and asset recovery.