Article 22 Responses to requests for information

Member States shall ensure that FIUs are able to respond in a timely manner to reasoned requests for information justified by concerns relating to money launderingmeans the conduct set out in Article 3, paragraphs 1 and 5, of Directive (EU) 2018/1673 including aiding and abetting, inciting and attempting to commit that conduct, whether the activities which generated the property to be laundered were carried out on the territory of a Member State or on that of a third country; knowledge, intent or purpose required as an element of that conduct may be inferred from objective factual circumstances;, its predicate offences or terrorist financingmeans the conduct set out in Article 11 of Directive (EU) 2017/541 including aiding and abetting, inciting and attempting to commit that conduct, whether carried out on the territory of a Member State or on that of a third country; knowledge, intent or purpose required as an element of that conduct may be inferred from objective factual circumstances; by the competent authoritiesmeans:a Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU);a supervisory authority;a public authority that has the function of investigating or prosecuting money laundering, its predicate offences or terrorist financing, or that has the function of tracing, seizing or freezing and confiscating criminal assets;a public authority with designated responsibilities for combating money laundering or terrorist financing; referred to in Article 2(1), points (44)(c) and (d), of Regulation (EU) 2024/1624 in their respective Member State where that information is already held by the FIU and is necessary on a case-by-case basis. The decision on conducting the dissemination of information shall remain with the FIU.

Where there are objective grounds for assuming that the provision of such information would have a negative impact on ongoing investigations or analyses, or, in exceptional circumstances, where disclosure of the information would be clearly disproportionate to the legitimate interests of a natural or legal person or irrelevant with regard to the purposes for which it has been requested, the FIU shall not be obliged to comply with the request for information.

In such cases, the FIU shall provide the reasons in writing to the requesting authority.

Competent authoritiesmeans:a Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU);a supervisory authority;a public authority that has the function of investigating or prosecuting money laundering, its predicate offences or terrorist financing, or that has the function of tracing, seizing or freezing and confiscating criminal assets;a public authority with designated responsibilities for combating money laundering or terrorist financing; shall provide feedback to the FIU about the use made of, and the usefulness of, the information provided in accordance with this Article and Article 19(3), and about the outcome of actions taken and of investigations performed on the basis of that information. Such feedback shall be provided as soon as possible and in any case, in an aggregated form, at least on an annual basis, in such a way as to allow the FIU to improve its operational analysis function.