Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre reports 108 FIU cooperation agreements and expanded Pacific capacity building

The Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) published an overview of its international engagement, setting out how it is extending cross-border financial intelligence cooperation and strengthening financial crime capabilities in the Pacific and Southeast Asia through partnerships, training and technology sharing. The update highlights support for Nauru’s successful bid to join the Egmont Group, taking the network to 183 financial intelligence units (FIUs), and AUSTRAC’s deployment of staff across five regions in Kuala Lumpur, Beijing, London, Washington and Suva. Tonga was added to AUSTRAC’s memorandum of understanding list, bringing the total to 108 agreements with international FIUs. Capacity-building activity included a new Financial Intelligence Tradecraft Training program for the Pacific, tradecraft workshops with Papua New Guinea’s Financial Analysis and Supervision Unit, and rollout of AUSTRAC’s TAIPAN financial intelligence system to 10 Pacific nations supported by training and operational activities such as the “TAIPAN Games”. Regionally, the Pacific Financial Intelligence Community plenary in Fiji brought together 15 FIUs to set a joint operational and capability agenda for 2026 and was followed by a meeting that re-established the Pacific Supervisors Forum. AUSTRAC also noted its permanent co-chair role in the 13-member Financial Intelligence Consultative Group and its co-chairing, alongside India, of the Egmont Group’s Asia Pacific Regional Group representing 32 countries, including work on an initiative analysing cryptocurrency adoption trends across the region.