Overview
Laundering money entails disguising the illicit origins of proceeds of financial manipulation, drug trade, fraud, corrupt enrichment, or other crimes, bringing back money into the financial circuit of the legal economy. Some underlying misbehavior, the so-called predicate offense generates illicit gains which are to be turned legal. Hiding or disguising the source of these proceeds will not amount to money laundering unless they were obtained from a criminal activity (Busuioc 2007).
Predicate offenses for laundering can be “hard” crime involving drugs or violence, but may also be white collar crimes, such as illicit real estate dealings, fraud and embezzlement, and finally tax fraud and tax evasion. Laundering the resulting (typically large amounts of) money can be achieved through fake invoicing for exports and imports or unusually priced real estate transactions. Disguising is further attempted through pumping money around foreign banks (typically in tax...
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Recommended Reading and References
Baker R (2005) Capitalism’s Archilles heel: dirty money and how to renew the free-market system. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley
Busuioc EM (2007) Defining money laundering. In: Unger B (ed) The scale and impacts of money laundering. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham/Northampton, pp 15–280
Deleanu I, van den Broek M, Ferwerda J, Unger B (2011) Performing in the books, assessing countries’ anti-money-laundering policy in the light of strategic reporting. Paper presented at the ECPR Conference 2011 in Reykjavik, Iceland. http://www.ecprnet.eu/MyECPR/proposals/reykjavik/uploads/papers/2734.pdf
FATF (2010) Financial action task force report on tax crime, Third round mutual evaluation report on Germany, Paris
Financial Action Task Force homepage. http://www.fatf-gafi.org
Gnutzmann H, McCarthy KJ, Unger B (2010) Dancing with the devil: country size and the incentive to tolerate money laundering. Int Rev Law Econ 30(3):244–252
IRS (2011) Suspicious activity reports. Retrieved from http://www.irs.gov
Masciandaro D, Takats E, Unger B (2007) Black finance: the economics of money laundering. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA
Sabitha A (ed) (2009) Combating money laundering. Transnational perspectives. Amicus Books: The Icfai University Press
Tackling money laundering, Special issue of Rev Law Econ 5(2):807–985. December 2009
Truman E, Reuter P (2004) Chasing dirty money: the fight against money laundering. Institute for International Economics, Washington, DC
Unger B (2007) The scale and impact of money laundering. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA
Unger B (2011) Regulating money laundering: from Al Capone to Al Qaeda. In: Levy D (ed) Handbook of regulation. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA
Unger B, den Hertog J (2012) Water always finds its ways. Crime Law Social Change 57:287–304
Unger B, Ferwerda J (2011) Money laundering in the real estate sector. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham. 2011 Review of Law and Economics, Special Issue on Money Laundering, Dec 2009. http://www.toezichtencompliance.nl/nieuws?cID=914&PHPSESSID=jdeaul6hts3u2cv6kdeubdhce6
Unger B, Rawlings G (2008) Competing for criminal money. Global Bus Econ Rev 10(3):331–352
United Nations Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC). www.unodc.org
Walker J (1995) Estimates of the extent of money laundering in and through Australia. Paper prepared for the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre, Sep 1995. John Walker Consulting Services, Queanbeyan
Walker J, Unger B (2009) Estimating money laundering: the walker gravity model. Rev Law Econ December
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media New York
About this entry
Cite this entry
Unger, B. (2014). Money Laundering. In: Bruinsma, G., Weisburd, D. (eds) Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5690-2_439
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5690-2_439
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4614-5689-6
Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-5690-2
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and Law