{"id":23683,"date":"2021-10-19T12:17:47","date_gmt":"2021-10-19T15:17:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=23683"},"modified":"2026-04-23T14:38:36","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T17:38:36","slug":"philippines-banks-warned-to-work-only-with-registered-pogos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/philippines-banks-warned-to-work-only-with-registered-pogos","title":{"rendered":"Philippines banks warned to work only with registered POGOs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Central Bank of the Philippines has reminded banks and financial institutions to deal only with registered POGOs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The Philippines.- A week after two\u00a0Philippine offshore gaming operators (POGOs)\u00a0<\/strong>had their\u00a0registrations revoked by the AMLC<\/a>\u00a0for failing to cooperate with the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC), the Central Bank of the Philippines has issued a warning about unlicensed POGOs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chuchi Fonacier, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Deputy Governor, told Philstar that BSP-regulated financial institutions (BSFI) should strictly comply with the requirements for customer due diligence, continuous monitoring and suspicious transaction reporting.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In February, POGOs<\/a> were ordered to register for the electronic reporting system managed by the AMLC.<\/strong> The decision followed an amendment to the Philippines\u2019 Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2001<\/strong> that includes real estate developers and brokers, and offshore gaming operators under the Act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are currently 41 POGOs operating in the Philippines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Philippines to punish officials who accepted bribes from POGOs<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

President Rodrigo Duterte<\/a> has said he expects the Department of Justice (DOJ) to punish officials from the Bureau of Immigration who were involved in a bribery scandal <\/strong>related to POGO workers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some\u00a043 immigration bureau officials<\/strong>\u00a0are accused of allowing Chinese nationals who worked at POGOs to enter the country without undergoing checks in exchange for nearly PHP10,000. Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque said\u00a0those involved\u00a0<\/strong>haven\u2019t been dismissed from service yet and have only been suspended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roque added: \u201cThe impact of Duterte\u2019s message is that the DOJ should perform its mandate<\/strong> to ensure their dismissal as soon as possible. The bribery scheme is not acceptable. They must be fired.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Central Bank of the Philippines has reminded banks and financial institutions to deal only with registered POGOs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":18057,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"The Central Bank of the Philippines has issued a directive to financial institutions to exclusively engage with registered Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs), reinforcing AML compliance following recent registration revocations by the AMLC. This move underscores heightened regulatory scrutiny on the POGO sector, further complicated by a concurrent government push to prosecute immigration officials implicated in a bribery scandal involving POGO workers.","focusai_entities":"Central Bank of the Philippines, POGOs, AMLC, Chuchi Fonacier, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, Philstar, Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2001, Department of Justice, Bureau of Immigration, Rodrigo Duterte, Harry Roque","focusai_location":"Philippines","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.9), payments_fraud_aml (1.0), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.8), journalist_researcher (1.0)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"POGO Sector Outlook","query":"What are the projected long-term impacts of the Central Bank's enhanced POGO compliance directives on the overall GGR and NGR of the Philippine iGaming market, considering potential further attrition of unlicensed operators?"},{"label":"Regulatory Enforcement Efficacy","query":"How will the AMLC's recent POGO registration revocations and the BSP's directive influence the effectiveness of anti-money laundering frameworks within the broader Philippine financial system, particularly concerning cross-border transactions?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16338,156],"tags":[15789],"class_list":["post-23683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-east-asia-news","category-regulation-news","tag-pogos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23683"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23683\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23708,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23683\/revisions\/23708"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18057"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}