French Monetary and Financial Code
In forceI. - The declaration provided for in II of Article L. 561-15 shall be made by the persons referred to in Article L. 561-2 in accordance with the specific nature of their profession, in accordance with the obligations of vigilance exercised over their customers and with regard to the documents they have gathered for this purpose.
II. - The criteria mentioned in II of Article L. 561-15 are as follows:
1° The use of shell companies, the activity of which is not consistent with the corporate purpose or which have their registered office in a State or territory that has not adhered to the standard relating to the exchange of information on request for tax purposes, or at the private address of one of the beneficiaries of the suspicious transaction or with a domiciliary within the meaning ofArticle L. 123-11 of the Commercial Code;
2° Carrying out financial transactions by companies in which there have been frequent changes to the articles of association that are not justified by the company's economic situation;
3° The interposition of natural persons acting only in appearance on behalf of companies or individuals involved in financial transactions;
4° Carrying out financial transactions that are inconsistent with the company's usual activities or suspicious transactions in sectors that are sensitive to VAT carousel fraud, such as the IT, telephony, electronic equipment, household electrical equipment, hi-fi and video sectors;
5° A sharp and unexplained increase, over a short period of time, in the sums credited to newly opened accounts or accounts that had previously been inactive or not very active, possibly linked to a significant increase in the number and volume of transactions or the use of dormant or not very active companies in which there may have been recent changes to the articles of association;
6° The discovery of anomalies in invoices or order forms when they are presented as proof of financial transactions, such as the absence of a company registration number, SIREN number, VAT number, invoice number, address or dates;
7° The unexplained use of accounts used as transit accounts or through which multiple debit and credit transactions are made, even though the account balances are often close to zero;
8° Frequent withdrawal of cash from a business account or deposit of cash in such an account not justified by the level or nature of the business activity;
9° Difficulty in identifying the beneficial owners and the links between the origin and destination of funds due to the use of intermediary accounts or accounts of non-financial professionals as transit accounts, or the use of complex corporate structures and legal and financial arrangements that make the management and administration mechanisms less than transparent;
10° International financial transactions with no apparent legal or economic purpose, usually limited to the simple transfer of funds to or from foreign countries, particularly when carried out with the States or territories referred to in 1°;
11° Refusal by the customer to produce documentary evidence of the source of the funds received or of the reasons given for the payments, or the impossibility of producing such evidence;
12° Transferring funds to a foreign country and then repatriating them in the form of loans;
13° Organising insolvency through the rapid sale of assets to related natural or legal persons or on terms that reflect a clear and unjustified imbalance in the terms of the sale;
14° The regular use by natural persons domiciled and carrying on business in France of accounts held by foreign companies;
15° The deposit by an individual of funds that are unrelated to his or her known business or financial situation;
16° carrying out a property transaction at a price that is clearly undervalued.
