The Chinese banking authorities have delayed the implementation of new requirements for financial institutions when it comes to client due diligence, identification information and transaction records.
On 21 February the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) and the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC) announced that the implementation of the “Financial Institution Client Due Diligence and Client Information and Transaction Record Storage Administrative Measures” (金融机构客户尽职调查和客户身份资料及交易记录保存管理办法) would be suspended due to technical reasons.
The Administrative Measures were originally scheduled to come into effect on 1 March, and create a small furore online when it was revealed that they would entail the registration of personal deposits or withdrawals in excess of 50,000 yuan.
A PBOC official said that smaller financial institutions had complained that the Measures would cause problems for them, forcing them to make large-scale overhauls to internal management systems, information systems, operations procedures and staff training programs.
“For this reason and following research, we have decided to suspend the implementation of the Measures,” said PBOC.
