October the 26th, 2022 - With Croatian Eurozone entry looming, more and more kuna cash is appearing in bank accounts having made its way there from sock drawers and under mattresses. How much of it is legitimate, however? With many of these amounts not exactly being small, these deposits might well attract the taxman's unwanted radar.
As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, as RTL has learned from the Croatian Association of Banks (HUB), back in June this year, household deposits reached 255.2 billion kuna, in July they rose to 259.6 billion kuna, and according to the latest Croatian National Bank (CNB) data, they rose to 263.4 billion kuna this August.
When compared to the same month last year, at least according to the Croatian National Bank, this is an increase in deposits of this kind by 22.3 billion kuna or 9.4%. Peoples' deposits have been growing rapidly for a couple of years already, meaning the growth of deposits was similar a year earlier compared to 2020, when they grew by 20.7 billion kuna or 9.2%. People in this country typically deposit far more foreign currency than they do kuna cash, so the share of foreign currency deposits was 59.4% or 156.5 billion kuna, while the share of kuna cash savings and stood at 7.1% or 18.9 billion kuna.
In this way, some of the money that has been under the radar until now will surely end up being deposited into various different bank accounts. If a larger amount appears on someone's account, the spotlight might well be switched on and the bank's due diligence and analysis procedures will automatically be activated. On top of that, there there is also the Law on the Prevention of Money Laundering and the Financing of Terrorism, which also prescribes which alarms need to be raised and when.
"Measures of in-depth analysis should basically ensure that banks get to know their clients and the transactions being carried out in detail, and include establishing the identity and verifying the identity of the party, collecting data on the purpose and intended nature of the business relationship, and carrying out the constant monitoring of the business relationship", they stated rom the CNB.
If an amount greater than 200,000 kuna appears in someone's account all of a sudden, regardless of who is carrying out that cash transaction, the bank is also obliged to collect information on the source of the funds.
For more, make sure to keep up with our dedicated news section.
