OK, I know this is the NYPost, but this may explain more than Section 230 or confederate traitors why Trump wanted to sink the NDAA. It’s because the NDAA also included banning anonymous shell companies. Now firms have to report who the beneficial owner of these companies is. It was brought in as a way to close a HUGE loophole in money laundering. Nobody wants to think the president of the US is engaged in money laundering, but after 4 years of Trump, hell, I don’t know.

The US government on Friday adopted legislation that bans anonymous shell companies by forcing firms to report their true owners.

The ban was included in a $740 billion defense bill vetoed by President Trump last month. Senators voted 81-13 on Friday to override Trump, after the House did so Monday.

Under the new policy, US-registered companies will have to report to the government their real owners, rather than cite other corporate entities designed to conceal that information.

Anti-money laundering advocates celebrated the development.

“In my view (and if Treasury writes bold regs), it’s even more important than the Patriot Act, best law of its kind since Bank Secrecy Act passage in 1970,” tweeted Josh Rudolph, a fellow for malign finance at the Alliance for Securing Democracy.

A 2011 World Bank report found that the US led the world in anonymous shell companies, with 10 times more anonymous entities than the top 41 tax havens combined, according to Reuters.

Greg Baer, CEO of the Bank Policy Institute, told the wire service last month that “the global law enforcement and national security community will reap enormous benefits from anti-money laundering policy that stops bad actors from using shell companies to shepherd crime across international borders.”

*snip*

The anti-shell company provision reportedly was advanced by Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia.

nypost.com

Closing this loophole is a huge big deal. A lot of the shenanigans that went on with the Malaysian sovereign wealth fund 1MDB was carried out through anonymous shell companies, for example. From my personal perspective, I wonder how much impact that is going to have on my evil too big to fail employer. I would assume that corporations, LLCs and the like will have to name their beneficial owners before they can access banking services. I’m pretty sure that was the case before in a lot of instances (because of Know Your Customer legislation and regulation) but this tightens the observation further.