That, now that, beyond all the underdevelopment and uncertainty of the project, that, is bad news.
Back in the spring of 2018 our banking partner – Pervesk – underwent inspection by its local supervisory institution, the Bank of Lithuania. It was its first inspection and it happened only 6 months after Pervesk was granted with an Electronic Money Institution License. As a start-up, Pervesk began with a small team and focused on growing into a sustainable business. Nevertheless, balancing business growth and compliance is a complicated task even for large companies.
As soon as Pervesk was made aware of the shortcomings of its AML procedures and policies, it halted the expansion of its business operations and shifted its attention to compliance in order to ensure that all requirements would be met. This involved significantly expanding its Compliance division which included hiring professionals with ACAMS certifications and experience working at the Central Bank, as well as adjusting internal policies and streamlining procedures. Even though the conduct of AML requirements had been overhauled and we consider it fixed, Pervesk was given a significant fine.
We have unfortunately learned the hard way that the guidance and mentoring a young company - on its first year of operation, expects to receive from regulatory institutions was not offered as promised. We were particularly surprised by the Bank’s decision, which did not take into account the company’ size, young age, the effort put towards fixing imperfections and the fact that there were no actual money laundering or terrorist financing instances found within Pervesk operations.
Pervesk is fully committed to adhering to regulations, therefore we believe that almost all shortcomings have been fixed. We would like to ensure our clients that we will not give up and we continue to move forward with our daily operations.
