Wise faces Belgium AML probe as earlier compliance gaps resurface

Belgian prosecutors have confirmed that Wise is under investigation over alleged failures in anti-money laundering controls, according to Becki Laporte, principal for AML strategy and innovation at FinScan. The scrutiny lands on a cross-border payments group that Laporte said processes about 4.7 million transactions a day and handled more than $243 billion in cross-border transfers in its 2026 financial year.

The case puts renewed attention on how fast-growing fintechs build financial crime controls across multiple jurisdictions. For payments firms, AML controls are the systems and procedures used to identify customers, assess risk, establish the source of funds, monitor transactions and report suspicious activity to authorities.

Laporte wrote that the Belgian inquiry follows earlier regulatory findings involving Wise in Abu Dhabi and the United States. She argued that the sequence shows the importance of addressing weaknesses once supervisors identify them, particularly for firms expanding across borders.

Earlier findings in Abu Dhabi and the US

In 2022, Abu Dhabi's Financial Services Regulatory Authority found that Wise had not established and maintained adequate AML systems and controls, according to Laporte. The regulator cited a failure to determine the source of funds held by high-risk customers before processing transactions.

The Abu Dhabi regulator also found that Wise failed to obtain senior management approval before starting relationships with a category of customers the company had identified as high risk, Laporte wrote. The penalty was set at $450,000 and reduced to $360,000 after Wise did not contest the findings and settled promptly, according to her account.

US state regulators later conducted a coordinated multi-state examination of Wise covering July 2022 through September 2023, Laporte wrote. Nine state money transmission regulators were involved, and their report identified weaknesses including an inadequate independent review of the AML programme, late suspicious activity report filings and transaction monitoring data integrity issues, according to Laporte.

Laporte said one of the most significant findings was the failure to correct identified deficiencies in a timely way. In AML supervision, remediation is a core measure of control effectiveness because a firm must show that issues found by regulators, auditors or internal reviews have been fixed and tested.

European scrutiny and wider fintech enforcement

Laporte wrote that Belgian prosecutors identified Wise accounts in hundreds of international criminal requests across more than 30 European countries. She said the breadth of those requests pointed to exposure across Wise's European operations.

The investigation comes as UK fintechs have faced substantial AML enforcement actions. Laporte cited Financial Conduct Authority fines against Starling of £28.9 million in 2024 and Monzo of £21 million in 2025, saying those penalties accounted for more than 90% of FCA fine values across those two years.

Laporte argued that regulators are applying bank-level expectations to fintechs as they mature. Her analysis said compliance functions need to scale with transaction volumes, customer growth and geographic reach, rather than remaining structured for an early-stage business.

Wise remains headquartered in London, placing its primary UK compliance responsibilities under the FCA's oversight, Laporte wrote. She said the UK regulator's silence at this stage was not unusual, while adding that conclusions reached in Brussels could draw attention from other supervisors.

This story draws on original reporting from Finextra Research.