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Mauritius: what Act No. 3 of 2026 changed for reporting entities

Mauritius's 2026 AML reform is not a new stand-alone law. Its full name is the Anti-Money Laundering, Combatting the Financing of Terrorism and Countering Proliferation Financing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2026, Act No. 3 of 2026. It is an amending Act.…

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Mauritius’s 2026 AML reform is not a new stand-alone law. Its full name is the Anti-Money Laundering, Combatting the Financing of Terrorism and Countering Proliferation Financing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2026, Act No. 3 of 2026. It is an amending Act. After the short title, each of its other 23 sections amends a separate enactment, from the Bank of Mauritius Act to the Registration of Associations Regulations 1979. Its stated aim is to amend those enactments to meet international standards on AML, CFT and countering proliferation financing.

It was introduced in the National Assembly as Bill No. III of 2026 on 24 March

  1. It was passed on 14 April, assented on 17 April, and gazetted and in force on

18 April 2026.

Section 10 of the Act amends the Financial Intelligence and Anti-Money Laundering Act (FIAMLA). The FIU’s consolidated text of FIAMLA shows those changes in force from 18 April 2026.

What changed for reporting entities

The FIU can order you to suspend a suspicious transaction

A new FIAMLA section 10A lets the FIU order a reporting person, in writing, to temporarily suspend a suspicious transaction. It can do so where it has to urgently verify data or collect more information, in Mauritius or abroad, or where it has reasonable grounds to believe the transaction, person or funds are related to money laundering, terrorist financing, proliferation financing or a related predicate offence.

  • The suspension lasts not more than 72 hours from the time the order is issued to you.
  • If that deadline falls on a Sunday, a public holiday or an FIU non-working day, the limit is not more than 120 hours.
  • The FIU may, on good cause shown, apply to a Judge to extend the suspension by a further 72 hours, or such other period as the Judge thinks fit.
  • If the FIU asks for more information on the suspended transaction, you must provide it within 24 hours of the request.
  • The FIU must inform the Financial Crimes Commission (FCC) of every order. It may end an order early, and must then tell you and the FCC.
  • You, your officers and your agents must not disclose that an order has been issued or terminated.

The FIU’s independence is now in the statute

A new FIAMLA section 9(5) provides that the FIU, in discharging its functions under the Act, is not subject to the direction or control of any person or authority.

Risk assessment and proliferation financing

  • Proliferation financing risk is defined narrowly. It “refers strictly and only to” the potential breach, non-implementation or evasion of targeted financial sanctions obligations under the United Nations (Financial Prohibitions, Arms Embargo and Travel Ban) Sanctions Act and FATF Recommendation 7.
  • You may identify, assess and manage proliferation financing risk within your existing targeted financial sanctions programme, your compliance programme, or both.
  • A supervisory authority may decide that its reporting persons need not document their risk assessments, provided the sector’s specific risks are clearly identified and understood and each reporting person understands its own risks.
  • Your policies, controls and procedures must mitigate the risks identified in your own risk assessment or in the national risk assessment.
  • The Ministry must, as far as practicable, make the national risk assessment findings available to reporting persons, and must publish a summary.

Customer due diligence and beneficial ownership

  • Existing customers. The CDD requirements apply to customers and beneficial owners with which you have a business relationship. The previous wording referred to a business relationship held on 9 August 2018.
  • Legal arrangements. For CDD, the beneficial owner of a legal arrangement includes the settlor, the trustee, any protector, each beneficiary or, where applicable, the class of beneficiaries and objects of a power, and any other natural person exercising ultimate effective control.
  • No clear owner. Where no natural person is identified as the beneficial owner of a legal person, or there is doubt, you must identify, and take reasonable measures to verify, the natural person who holds the position of senior managing official.
  • Trustees must help. Under the amended Trusts Act, a trustee must, on request, give a reporting person information on the trust’s beneficial ownership and on trust assets to be held or managed under the business relationship.

Scope and definitions

  • Financial institution. The FIAMLA definition was replaced. It lists persons licensed, registered or authorised under named Acts, among them qualified trustees under the Trusts Act, the Variable Capital Companies Act 2022 and the Virtual Asset and Initial Token Offering Services Act 2021, plus credit unions. It excludes the licence categories in a new Fifth Schedule, such as securities exchanges and insurers conducting general insurance business.
  • Transaction. The replaced definition of “transaction” includes a proposed or an attempted transaction.
  • Casinos. A licensed operator of a casino and a gaming house A must comply with FIAMLA where a customer’s total cumulative financial transaction on any given date is Rs 50,000 or more, or the equivalent in foreign currency.
  • Real estate. The replaced First Schedule entry for real estate agents includes land promoters, property developers and a person employed by the State, a statutory body or another prescribed body who, in the discharge of his functions, carries out a real estate transaction (in so far as it relates to AML/CFT).

Sanctions: no later than 24 hours

Under the amended United Nations (Financial Prohibitions, Arms Embargo and Travel Ban) Sanctions Act, the duties, obligations and prohibitions in its sections 23, 24 and 25 apply immediately, and no later than 24 hours after either:

  • the National Sanctions Secretariat gives public notice that the Secretary for Home Affairs has declared a designated party; or
  • the UN Security Council publishes a UN Sanctions List, including any change to it.

Other amendments that reach reporting entities

  • FCC information notices. For an asset recovery investigation, the FCC may, by notice, require a financial institution to provide customer and account information on a person named in the notice. It needs reasonable grounds to suspect that the person’s property is proceeds, an instrumentality or terrorist property, or that the person has benefited from unlawful activity; that the information is likely to be of substantial value to an application or investigation; or that providing it is in the public interest. The institution must provide it within 48 hours of service. Failing to comply is an offence punishable by a fine of up to Rs 1 million.
  • Unexplained wealth. Part VI of the Financial Crimes Commission Act 2023, on unexplained wealth, applied to the property of citizens of Mauritius. The 2026 Act extends it to residents of Mauritius, including legal persons.
  • Bank of Mauritius penalties. Before the Bank of Mauritius imposes an administrative penalty on a bank or cash dealer under FIAMLA, it must notify its intention and grounds, the type and terms of the penalty, and the right to make written representations within 21 days. A dissatisfied bank or cash dealer may apply for judicial review.
  • Accountants. New Financial Reporting Act sections give the Mauritius Institute of Professional Accountants powers over professional accountants, public accountants and member firms. It may carry out on-site inspections, including to verify whether they undertake transactions or activities listed in Part II of FIAMLA’s First Schedule. It may give written directions where it has reasonable cause to believe they are failing to take the measures the Financial Reporting Act requires.

Who supervises what

BodyRole under FIAMLA, as amended
Bank of MauritiusSupervises and enforces compliance by banks and cash dealers. Its licensee types are banks, foreign exchange dealers, money changers and non-bank deposit-taking institutions. Since 2026 a “foreign exchange dealer” under the Banking Act also covers money or value transfer services.
Financial Services CommissionSupervises and enforces compliance by the financial institutions under its purview. The FIU lists these as licensees under the Financial Services Act (ss.14, 77, 77A, 79A), the Insurance Act, the Securities Act, the Captive Insurance Act, the Private Pension Schemes Act (s.12), qualified trustees and the Virtual Asset and Initial Token Offering Services Act 2021.
FIUThe central agency for receiving, requesting, analysing and disseminating disclosures. Suspicious transaction reports are due promptly and no later than 5 working days after the suspicion arose. The FIU is also the regulatory body for law firms, attorneys, barristers, notaries, dealers in jewellery, precious stones or precious metals, and real estate agents.
Mauritius Institute of Professional AccountantsRegulatory body for professional accountants, public accountants and member firms.
Gambling Regulatory AuthorityRegulatory body for casino and gaming house A licensees.
Registrar of CompaniesRegulatory body for company service providers.
Registrar of Co-operative SocietiesNamed in FIAMLA’s definition of supervisory authority, alongside the Bank of Mauritius and the FSC.
Financial Crimes CommissionDescribes itself as the apex agency for the detection, investigation and prosecution of financial crimes. Before referring an asset recovery case to the FCC, another investigatory authority must carry out a preliminary investigation to identify assets suspected to be proceeds of crime.

The 2026 Act also gives supervisors two new tools:

  • Group supervision. A supervisory authority conducts, where applicable, consolidated AML/CFT supervision of a group that includes a reporting person, through off-site and on-site supervision.
  • Information exchange. A competent authority, which includes a supervisory authority, a regulatory body and an investigatory authority, may exchange AML/CFT information with local competent authorities and foreign counterparts, spontaneously or on request. The Bank of Mauritius, the FSC and the Registrar of Cooperative Societies may, when relevant for AML/CFT purposes, exchange regulatory, prudential and AML/CFT information, including customer due diligence information and customer files, with other supervisors that share responsibility for financial institutions in the same group.

The evaluation timeline

  • ESAAMLG’s calendar. Its third-round assessments calendar lists Mauritius’s last evaluation as July 2018, a possible on-site visit in January/February 2028, and a possible plenary discussion in August/September 2028.
  • The national strategy. The National AML/CFT Strategy 2026-2029 says the mutual evaluation will be conducted by ESAAMLG as from 2027, and that an Inter-Ministerial Committee oversees the preparatory work. The FCC’s Bulletin Issue No. 03 (June 2026) refers to the 2027 ESAAMLG Mutual Evaluation.
  • What is assessed. The FIU explains that an evaluation covers technical compliance, meaning whether the laws, regulations and institutional framework are in place, and effectiveness, meaning whether the AML/CFT system is working.
  • Data. The 2026 Act creates a Centralised Information Management System within the Ministry. One of its functions is to facilitate reporting to international bodies, including the FATF and ESAAMLG. The National Committee must also keep statistics, including on suspicious transactions received and disseminated.

Three things worth doing

  1. Walk through an FIU suspension order. Who receives a written order, who can hold the payment at once, who answers the FIU’s follow-up within 24 hours, and how the order is kept confidential, including when it arrives before a weekend or public holiday.
  2. Line your risk assessment up with the national one. Check that your controls address the risks in the national risk assessment as well as your own, whether proliferation financing risk will sit inside your sanctions programme, as the Act allows, and that new designations and UN list changes are applied within 24 hours.
  3. Refresh beneficial ownership on trusts and existing customers. Test files against the new legal-arrangement definition, use the trustee’s duty to give you beneficial ownership information, and make sure an FCC notice can be answered within 48 hours.

SonarPulse in this jurisdiction: AML/CFT screening software for Mauritius

Sources

This article draws on the following sources. Follow the links for the original text.

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