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Gatenox
The growing demand in human and tech compliance capabilities.
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Welcome to the Crypto Compliance Podcast, the gate knobs. Paulo Kuzkov's key welcoming Crypto Compliance by gate knobs were complies experts and practitioners are talking about current market events and general compliance aspects. We are doing this to promote compliance in crypto and bringing exciting toppings to our crypt community. Today, I talked with Mark Watswabak, CEO and founder of Amwek Company which is the Financial Crime Outsourcing Advisor and Recruitment Services. Mark founded the VMware campaign after an earlier career in the probation services spent rehabilitating the most dangerous offender in the UK.
It was fascinating to in conversation about technology and humans and compliance, the future of compliance, why this is the most hotest area in the in terms of recruitment and if Chachi BT will replace compliance experts. I want to ask you to like our podcast, comment it, share it, and subscribe to our channel. Let's together promote compliance culture in crypto and web three zero. This podcast brought to you by Gaynux a comprehensive compliance and verification service for organization participating in digital economy. Gatenock's platform streamlines the corporate KYC process, bringing together all parts of the customer onboarding experience into a single solution. Hi, Mark. It's a pleasure to have you here on our Crypto Compliance Podcast.
So, Mark, you're running successful financial crime advisory outsourcing and recruitment business for many, many years. So and what this is the reason why we have you here. So can you tell us a little bit more about m weeks? Absolutely. First of all, Pavel. Great to be chatting to you. Thanks for inviting me. That to be here looking forward to it. So so the reason we're here is, historically, I have a recruitment business that is focused on the emerging technology sector. Naturally, within the last four or five years, crypto is kind of dominated that conversation for us from a growth growth perspective, so within loads in digital assets.
I would say last year, in the middle of last year, there was a concerted outreach from a number of our clients, major clients within the digital assets, cryptospace for remedial kind of attention to be drawn to what kinds have done from a KYC onboarding perspective. In an unregulated market, it's very easy to onboard people without doing the right kind of checks. So a number of kind of two compliance officers CFOs, CEOs that we know, asked us, can we help? Look at what we have done previously and get us future state and future proofed for whatever regulation is coming and whatever a regulator or advisory kind of oversight firm would like to see. So that's when nWec Solutions, the outsourcing business was born.
Really, with that immediate focus on digital assets, there are, you know, tens of thousands genuinely. When when we first looked of clients with addressable concerns or needs within historical onboarding and process. So we are building, as a result, the largest financial crime community on earth. That's our goal, which at the top is very much like an expert network stacked with, you know, people who run regulators, investment banks, whatever firm onboards, the compliance layer at the most senior level is is what's at the top.
And that that that that kind of cascades all the way through to the heaviest populated layer of KYC transaction monitoring, AML professionals all around the globe that we can mobilize within days and hours through the power of community to solve problems on mass and actually what we found prevalent. You you you gave me one of the the quotes that I use a lot within my business. And it's actually that financial crime is one of the biggest industries on earth. You know, so it's not like we're even tickling a niche here. This is a massive, massive industry.
So as a result of what we're doing in crypto, digital assets, we are getting outreach from companies all over the world who want help quickly within onboarding, KYC, and financial crime. That could be an investment bank. It could be a fund administrator, judiciary, legal firm, commercial real estate. This is truly a massive, massive industry. So for building a community of like minded people, we can speak to anyone on this planet about financial crime and and and and help them from an advisory kind of staff augmentation And, honestly, the the the use case is is almost endless. It's it's been a busy fun year so far. That's for sure. Yeah. And I spent twenty years in compliance.
So, you know, I I know what you are talking about, and that's always interesting for me how big is this sector, you know, and also how little attention it is paid. You know? So I think I mean, there is, like, people are talking about this, but in general, you know, there's interesting data coming out from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, which says it's gonna be we need to have additional twenty three thousand people compliance jobs by two thousand twenty six. That's massive. That's huge. Yeah. That's one side, you know.
But at the same, you know, on the same side, you have on the other side, you have the technology in which I'm which I see over years, it's dramatically increasing. Right? So the way we redid KYC, the way the way we did KYB many, many years ago. It's nothing to compare to right now. Right? So where do you see I mean, where is the graph coming from? And do you see actually this graph still being, like, very, very active? Yeah. One hundred percent. It's it's probably ninety percent of of my focus across my businesses at the moment.
I remember six, seven years ago, you know, compliance was, you know, the ugly sister. It's like, yeah. Yeah. We'll come to that first. We we wanna make we wanna make money, you know. So let's let's onboard people. Let's do bitterness, and we'll sort that out afterwards. We have seen a massive flip reversal of that. You know, not just in the crypto space with the FTX scandals and, you know, three hours capital and so on and so forth, of of which that that house of cards hasn't finished stumbling yet. You have you have seen I I mean, let's just stick stick with indigenous lessons.
If you go to any major, you know, events or conference, I would say, you know, five, six years ago, very, very few technology firms within KYC or transaction monitoring or compliance I'd say half of the stalls there now are are firms within that space. You know, if you look at transaction monitoring, I could give you a list of ten companies or just stand next to each other at every single conference, you know. So it's it's it's it's a it's a huge industry. And I think as the regulators get a little bit more savvy as to financial crime. And and technology makes it a lot easier for those who want to commit financial crime.
You know, those there's not just an increased focus within digital assets. I think it's across its pan industry. And and the need for compliance is is just doing this. We have five or six clients now where, you know, these are big major clients, big global conglomerates as well as, you know, high growth fintechs and others, and compliance is the top of almost every single CEO's agenda. You know, are we safe? Are we secure? Are we doing things in the right way? And if not, let's fix it now because we have to. Yeah.
But at the same time, when you you know, and we spoke with the about this before, right, it's what I what I saw in my career is typically when the crisis comes, that's typically when the compliance people are fired, you know, and that's something which we saw this time around especially in crypto. Right? At the same time, so when you, you know, the crisis crisis gone, you have marketing, sales, tech, employed, you know, so these are typically hot seats, you know, they remain hot seats, you know, in the crisis. But then you have the compliance people, you know, hired lots. You know, you have the less to hire, first to hire. Right? Yeah.
And and that has typically been what it is. Honestly and and I can only talk from my business. Right? I can't talk from the perspective of of competitors sort of people in the space. Commercial and technology people are losing their jobs at the moment. Three hundred thousand redundancies in tech at the moment. Compliance unless there is a a a person or an individual or team within compliance that are performing particularly well, that is where there is a hiring focus at the moment. And I mean that across the board. So this is even within the last, let's say, three to six months.
There has been a seismic shift in in in the hiring need for compliance. Rather than the firing need for compliance when a crisis come. So it's it's definitely a a shift that's happened relatively recently, I'd say. Yeah. And when I mean, do you think it's because the regulations are more strict or the business are realizing, okay, we need we need compliance and, you know, we need someone, you know, who is and what's the if you then if you someone is recognizing, but it's it's actually relevant. Right? What type of people they are looking for.
I mean, because you can, you know, typically, you can go for, like, someone who speaks compliance Right? And they use some buzzwords. I don't know. KYC, you know, transaction when you're doing for server like this. Or someone who actually understand the job, delivers on the job is helping the business to grow. No idea. So what's your like, when you talk to companies who are looking for people? What what's their focus? Yeah. It's a good question. So I think it's it's a it's a bit of everything.
You know, and and and just to go back to your point on why I think the why is we are now abundantly aware that we have not been doing business in the right way. Because we have seen lots of other companies fall by the wayside, fall compliance related issues. This isn't just digital assets. This is financial services. You know, we need to make sure our our house is in order. And also, I think it's an awareness that we haven't been doing it very well, you know. We actually, you know, have put this down the agenda. This is big become further down the the the priority list for the c suite.
But now with where you just have to look at the news, you know, compliance is is on top of everything. It it it is a a shifting priority for for most firms across most industries. And what do people want? Well, this is where you get the the kind of battle or the the the kind of fight for talent. Because, you know, you look a few years ago in Silicon Valley who's who can get the best development straight out of, you know, the the kind of red brick and or, you know, the the the big major MITs and so on in the state.
It's I wouldn't say we're there with compliance, but, you know, for our recruitment business, you know, somebody let's just talk FCA registered if if they are FCA, you know, that's SMS sixteen and seventeen. And they've done a little bit of risk as well. They came at such a premium. It's not even funny because a a client will snap their hand off if they can be both commercial advisory and hands on. So, you know, those those chief compliance officers who who have that advisory and commercial capacity and have a good relationship with the regulator and understand how how they work and operate for good battle or or locally.
You know, they are hugely in demand. And then you look at KYC, this is a huge surge as well. We have part of our business. It's just surge support. You know, if if a big exchange in quick goes down. There's a huge need for for lots of other changes to onboard cards quickly. Kit companies in digital assets don't have huge onboarding teams. You know, they don't have huge compliance teams. And actually, that's not to their credit at the moment because Onboarding and crypto is pretty poor across the board. You know, lots of companies have these institutional onboarding processes.
That just drop out because they're either over manual or they don't have enough people to to to do the outreach, and clients just fall through the net and go somewhere else. So there's a huge need for the the the a skilled KYC analyst in this market as well. And that's, you know, another reason why we've built this community that we can Yeah. We can Hold hold on. You know, reading what you which just said. Right? You know, listening which just said. Yep. Kind of what you describe is what I see what I say, it's a it's a human interface of compliance. Which is the most critical.
Right? So -- Mhmm. -- you know, they can someone who can explain why regulations needs to be followed to the business to c level to the regulators. So it's almost someone who is, like, you know, translating from regulation to human Right? And that's the and that's always gonna be like this. You know, it's gonna be always this aspect of, you know, human interaction But at the same time, what I see and that's something which, you know, which we have engagements, you know, the the amount of work being done by you know, technology historic I mean, replacing historical processes. It's around seventy five percent, which is perfect. Right. I think, you know, this is perfect.
Because, you know, when I when I was in RBS, you know, and we had people on the ground in India. I think outsourcing to India is almost I mean, I'm not saying this in this way, but, you know, like, it's almost like replacing this with automation. Right? Because this is like, you know, the process is, you know, shifted outside and there's someone who is responsible, but nobody in the head water knows the name of these people. That's typically what's happening. Right? You know, errors interesting errors coming up. But in principle, you know, for me, it was like, alright. These guys are effectively, you know, plug into technology.
Right? You know? That's something we just and there was always like, oh my god. You know, we it can be replaced and it should be replaced. Well, look, KYC no matter where you look, KYC is KYC, or k y b. Right? It is a thing, you know, ostensibly it has a linear process and it has things that you need to check and things that you need to gather in order to make a a compliant rationale decision on on on who is here and and are they safe. Right. And you can do that in a linear process.
However, then you have the issue every despite it being in KYC, every client I know, every single one has a different process because they have interpreted what they need to achieve from. It's slightly differently to somebody else. Or somebody in the regulatory space or the policy space down there has said, well, actually, we think the regulator means this. You know, no one has a particularly strong relationship with the regulator because the regulator is is I'm not that mouthing the regulator, the regulator is a regulator, and businesses tend to be commercial in nature. Whereas the SCA or the, you know, gaffe, they're not. They're they're regulators.
So everyone does things slightly differently, and everyone has a slightly different separation. So you I I well, you know that I know this and this is why we talk a lot. You you can and should be able to automate way more. Right. There is still, however, always that manual point where something will fall out and a human has to interject. They have to at the moment. You know, I can't see that far down the future where that will change. And I'm sure we'll come onto the AI topic at some point. But, yeah, KYC has done differently everywhere. And then you talked about the the the regulatory side.
How do people translate what the regulations actually mean, particularly when they're nebulous? Or not even or or or not here -- Yeah. -- you know, in many cases. So then you have, you know, some companies that are more scrupulous than others. So it's it's, you know, it's a it's a it's a messy area where there's a lot of cleaning up that needs to be done. But it's definitely rising up everybody's agenda. Alright. You mentioned that you had, you know, you have a lot of conversation with with businesses and that's your, you know, daily routine.
What's the key driver for them in terms of recruiting? You know, we spoke about it, but let's let's drill this down. Is it fines or it's someone who is who wants to well, I mean, it's very difficult to for me to accept the the statement. Oh, you know, someone wants to do good things, you know, and someone wants to I mean, it's not happening this way. It's either fives the risk of, you know, losing business or license or, you know, all those two. Yeah. See, so it's it's it's it's right. Hold on.
So if we look at it from an onboarding perspective, if we're losing fifty percent of potential clients from an onboarding process, because we can't carry see them on time, how much money are we as a business leaving on the table? And actually, if you sort that solution out, you can become a more profitable business. Then the other one is, you know, retrospectively, we probably have been a little bit naughty. Or we haven't paid as much attention to compliant processes as we should.
And therefore, with what the regulators are saying and what regulation is coming, or or or what we need to do, we need to make sure that if we're looked at, we are compliant, and we probably haven't done so. And this isn't just digital assets. This is businesses all over the place. So I think a lot of it is fear that we haven't been operating properly, and we've been you know, overly commercial in nature and and and and seeing compliance and onboarding and and And and what comes with that? See there's something we can retrospectively solve. I think now to onboard better and to avoid the risk of fine regulatory shutdown. No.
There's lots of companies where the a regulator will close down the license through through malpractice. You know, we're dealing with plenty of companies, you know, who who who have unfortunately fallen by the wayside at as as a result of that. So I think fear and and and definitely wanting to be compliant because the regulator's gonna be taking a closer look. He's number one driver, and nobody wants to be in trouble. You know? Second secondly, I think, you know, people can see that a better KYC in onboarding process, in particular, can have huge commercial benefits for a business. So there is there is an increasing kind of sexiness to compliance if you like.
That doing well and you make more money rather than compliance historically as seen as, you know, the, you know, the the a grumpy father-in-law who just stops you doing anything. Hundred percent, you know, there's like Yeah. Oh, it's the case. Oh, it's the case. Let's slightly off topic. You you deal a lot with people, right, on a daily basis. And in your earlier career, you did the probation services. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Because I know that we didn't talk about this before. Right? I mean, we talk about our on the first meeting, and I know that we didn't talk before this recording.
So tell me, I mean, is it helpful what you learned? In this or, like, what you're what you're dealing with people, you know, what you learn from this? Yeah. I I think it is. Particularly from the recruitment side, actually, because, you know, I I was dealing with serial killers and pedophiles and murderers and terrorists and so on. I was you know, I I I had the the privilege of of working some of the with the most serious offenses in the country. And actually, they'll have different personalities and profiles and ways of making decisions that enable them to do something.
So, actually, from a recruitment perspective, being able speak to people and just sniffing out what the truth is and what the truth isn't. I I think I is is is a skill that I do have, fortunately, from from from my previous career. And it's very easy to sniff out somebody in compliance who's not doing a particularly good job. Because it's it's you you you you can just tell quite quickly by asking the right question. So I I think it it has helped. I haven't got any criminals through it yet. But but, yeah, it definitely helped me to to ask the right questions, not just the people, but companies.
And and how they how they act and how they perform. Yeah. It's funny what you said, you know, on this sneaking because I have exactly the same approach. Right? And I know how the good compliance person or, you know, really, really good compliance, you know, AML expert would look like, talk like, you know, and where is where is, you know, somebody is actually, you know, trying some bullshit. Right? Yeah. And that's I don't have this for sales. Right now, I mean, I grow over time, right, in in in sales area.
Right? You you hear, you know, the words they're using, you know, the, you know, what, how they behave, you know, all this stuff acting, reacting, you know. That's something we which is really interesting. But at the same time, IT sector, I cannot, you know, understand who is good performer, bad performance. And so that's how many which is, like, you know, know, it's it's it's very different. You know, certain skill sets are are very different. You to to test a good developer, typically, you have to do a test. Right, to see how good somebody is when it comes to their programming language of choice.
A salesperson isn't completely it's the opposite end of the spec them. So to ascertain what good is you have to ask different questions. And actually, prospect potentially be a lot more probing. And and and and think a little more laterally. That's not the case for all all roles, of course, but I think it's a it's it's a good rule of thumb. Yeah. But I think, you know, interesting and, you know, knowing what you're doing, you know, one of the things which I know you're developing. I don't know where you are at the moment with this, you know, in particular, and if you want to talk is is the risk part.
Right? And that's something which is hugely hugely interest. Right? And I frankly, you know, and we we spoke about this before. And I think if if this is gonna be successful and it's probably will be successful, it's gonna be huge, huge deal. And that's dealing with and, you know, I'll let you explain, you know, the risk part part.
But I think, you know, this is where motivation, training, and recruitment comes together and decided to be very, very important parts of the compliance journey that in general, you know, because I I know so many people who have burned out in compliance and simply, you know, lose one percent of growing, which is pretty normal in in, like, every industry. But, you know, like, it's it's a tedious sometimes really not recognize work of compliance people. Right? So tell me more about the risk risk quote. Thanks. Yeah. So so the risk pod is the beating heart of our outsourcing business.
It is as I mentioned in in brief, star, we are aiming to build the largest community on earth. We have a formal launch for it next month of people within the financial crime and regulation space. Actually, you we we found already that the our legal division of the risk pot is growing as our mothers. But, essentially, it's that compliance community that we're looking to extrapolate globally. So we have people in all four corners of the world on it. The reason it's so important is, I don't know, Let's say you are a a company with thousands of client files that you need to remediate and or work on or build a a better process.
You can go to a KPMG or I'm I'm I won't name other company names, an advisory firm. And it will take a long time to staff a project of you know, ten, twenty, twenty five, fifty plus people. The the the community for us is great because it's you know, it's a bit of a bad job on how we we certainly want it to be because people refer good people into it. And they are vetted and are tested and are are allowed entry into that community where you can get mentorship, mentee ship, you know, training access to opportunity and lots of other things.
Trust me, there's a lot coming with the community that that that that we will build. But it's sensitive that the power in it is. There's fourteen thousand people in it at the moment that we can talk to. You know, not every single one of those has been vetted yet, but many, many have. So if we get, you know, a client that needs x amount of people, whether they're on shore whether they're in house, whether they're remote. Within a really quick period of time, we can ask our community a question. And we can build a pod or pods of people at all levels that manage themselves on client side to do work really well.
They are trained vetted, experienced, and they can come in and solve problems really, really, really quickly. Naturally, we have that advisory level. We've got John Carr, who's actually a risk officer who is as good as it gets, you know, as well as other advisory board members. But the community itself just answers any question. So it's a really powerful thing. Yet, you've seen it in action a little bit, Pavel, you know. Newer at our first event as a as a part of ours. That I don't know.
There's just something about it, isn't that? It's it's it's a growing community of people who get access in in in an area that is growing. So it's yeah. It's a really exciting time to be part of it. I think, like, Friday, this is this was missing for I mean, long time, this type of approach. And, you know, I've I've been running association of compliance officers in Poland -- Yeah. -- right -- Yeah. -- for many, many years. And it's kind of, you know, what you're saying, it's association but commercial. Right? It's kind of my feeling.
Right? That you can you know, you have people who are supporting each other, you know, exchange knowledge. You have knowledge, you know, brought to them, you know, motivation. And it's mean, it's funny because when you think about this, you know, the concept is pretty straightforward. Right? No. Why nobody else is is doing this on the on the market that's very, very interesting. Right? And I think, you know, it's it's definitely needed. And on this point, you know, so Like, when you talk to, you know, when when I was in RBS, you know, or, you know, UBS, we spend a lot of money on third party outsourcing or staff augmentation, all this stuff.
We're just kind of saying a lot my oh my god. You know, this is k p k p m g. You mentioned k p m k p m g. K p m g was I mean, it was in the worst, you know, the frank dispute. Okay. Yeah. No comment on this. And, you know, like so but there is still huge need on the outsourcing, right, and staff augmentation. Age. What's the what's the main main driver here? I mean, is it, like, you we cannot recognize where the peak is coming or you know, we need some people immediately or it's it's it's across, honestly, it's across the board.
And if you think what the risk pod can do, right, so you pay a big for an advisory firm, x amount of money. Our community is ostensibly the biggest bench on earth. That's what we're trying to create. We but they're not it's not a paid bench. These people are still working and or in contract positions and or looking for work. They are part of a a community. Where they will be reached out to and get access to any one point.
We know that every single year, tens of thousands of companies is actually more than that, that we can address onboard or have to review their client files in various jurisdictions and various locations. You know, if you're doing it in the Cayman Islands, a very different way of verifying documents as there is when you do it in Singapore and so on and so forth. The risk part, we can just put people with that regional abilities and skill sets on-site within a day, within a day, or remotely within even less time.
So so the need is is across, you know, it could be transactional monitoring, for example, but it's predominantly KYC on and off boarding. Right? Because that's where the need is. And reviewing and remediating, you know, files, things change a lot. You know, that your your clients as a business aren't gonna reach out to you and you know, tell you when there's been a change of UBOs or, you you know, somebody's moved house or this company has moved, you know, address formally. These are things that have to be updated to ensure this is a smidgen of the things that are needed, of course.
Everyone needs this this this high high intensity but not permanent resource to ensure that the clients that they're working with, they can work with in a compliant legal manner. And therefore, everyone needs it. And if one enter paid far more money for it than they should. The risk body is is really looking to But what's the what's the driver for the company to get, you know, like, when you talk like, what's the typical, let's say, oh, we are we have this problem and, you know, that's why we need people. What's the this problem typical is? So there's there's there's a few. Remediation is one. That's for sure. Right? You know? So Yeah.
It's just the big that is that hands down the big one. Which is hands down. It's crazy, you know, when you think of a lot. You know, like, I KPI I mean, when I was, again, you know, in RBS. Now KPG was saying to me, we live from it to remediation. Right? We live for remediation. And the amount of money spent on that moment was, like, you know. It's it's insane. And and it is insane. That that is the the key one. And the reason that is the key one is because that's a true volume piece of work. Right. Right.
That that An organization doesn't need to have twenty five permanent people to review client files. Or refresh them. What they need is a hard, short, short resource that can be augmented quick do the job and move on and build a better process and leave it in a better place. The other things that clients need are, you know, are we are we working in the best way moving forwards to onboard, for example? So that's where things like gate locks really comes in. Actually is our process to manual. You know? So so so the biggest need is retrospective looking.
Then the second biggest need is what are we doing actually now to make our process better so that when we look forwards, we're spending less time and money on this. Right. And then you need, like, top experts to do this. Right? That's where the advisory part of the business comes in. Okay. That makes sense. That makes sense. But, you know, I I think, you know, like, coming back to to our, you know, main topic technology versus human. Right? Yeah. I see a lot, you know, when we drill down from our perspective, from gateway's perspective into what we can do with open AI or similar to, you know, AI solution.
That's, like, huge huge impact. Right? Mailing documents, summarizing them, translating to different languages. Analyzing information which you have on the Internet website for the company. That's KYC KYB perspective. Right? Writing SARS, which you're gonna be very, very interested, you know, going forward. There's, like, so many topics, you know, and I mean, we we catch up before. Right? You know? So what's what's your conversation with the client? You know, it's incredible to hear it's so opposite view. Right? From the clients. So tell me what you hear from from on this. So we are we are at a very nascent point of AI. Right. AI has been around for a long time.
But when when we're talking about this particular topic, there's an appetite for it, but almost not So we cannot trust AI to do a job at the moment that is so intrinsically important to our business. And therefore, We don't trust AI. Essentially, to make decisions, particularly when it comes to compliance and risk. I think you you make a good point there actually. Can you use AI to do information gathering more quickly? That that I think is is a no brainer for anybody. But there there isn't a client I've spoken to when we say, there's an AI tool that does does this and can help you make this decision.
There's just an intrinsic fear that clicks in. So, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold on. Are we giving our kind of compliant decision making ability over to ostensibly a robot. We're not comfortable with that. So I think there's still that. Kind of dichotomy between, you know, why a robot can be trusted with or not, whether or not. I mean, we we the AI is it makes a lot of things in compliance and KYC so much easier. So much easier, particularly from an information gathering kind of assessment and and kind of reach out perspective, it makes complete sense. I think there's just a fear of what could go wrong.
The fear, I mean, like, the idea for me And I'm speaking about this for, I think, last ten years is that compliance will need to be very comfortable with technology. Right? And unfortunately, we don't see this happening as quickly as we would expect quite opposite. I think, you know, one of the things which we see is you know, I'd rather work on my Excel spreadsheet for the next two, three years even though it's I know that it's you know, I I did do a lot of errors, you know, all the stuff and don't apply technology. Typically, when we see the change the change is coming from c level outside compliance. Right? And then something which is striking.
What's your what's your view on this? Where where do you think Do you think that the the compliance group is overly conservative? I mean, by nature, they should be. Right? But, you know and I I was in this in in bashes for, like, fifteen years almost. Right? When now's in in banking and AML compliance for many, many years. And it's like, right, you cannot be entrepreneurial or risk taking in compliance. Right? So it's kind of that is interesting technology versus, you know, compliance play. Right? Yeah. It it's it's there's a long way to go. That's for sure.
You know? If you're if you're a trader and you can you know, use a piece of technology to speed up your kind of decisioning? Absolutely. If you're in compliance, that kind of flies in the face of what compliance is in terms of thoroughness. So whether that's true or not, there is a a a fear that, you know, we have to look at this issue with a magnifying glass and it needs to be a human that does it so that we know we can we can practically say we have looked at this. So I think there's just a long way to go.
So I think technology still needs to be able to convince a lot of people in compliance stuff. Then the right way to go. I think where where most compliance people I speak to, definitely definitely see the value in tech is speeding up the automation. Of of reach out, of onboarding, of APIs into companies as to get the information to that that kind of stuff. There's a there's a definite appetite for that transaction monitoring and SaaS. That's quite an obvious one on on that side because that you know, it's technology that that that can do that.
I think, you know, on the decision making process, there's a massive aversion to using any technology, and that has to be the person. There is definitely an appetite for how can we speed up the gathering of information and and how we process the KYC part of the the journey within the client, low cycle management. Process. Okay. In terms of skills which you see are Like, if you would be advising, right, your compliance friends, where to focus in terms of development? To stay relevant and to grow for the next five years. Right? Where would you say is the biggest grow and what's actually, right now, miss it the most. Good question. So regulation one. That are understanding regulations? Or Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. And being able to interpret it and and build process into your business quickly. You know, the advisory side, right, kind of in the minds of it. Hundred percent. The amount of my clients that are consistently asking for legal advice through the risk part is just doing this, this, and this, and this. So if you have a com an advisory kind of skill set to your compliance business, that's a huge boom. That's that's that's Okay. I I I I I've as Gil said that he's really well paid for and really important, particularly if you look at digital assets. Yeah.
Reg regulation is gonna come in swathes and it's gonna be different from country to country from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, from region to region from company to company. You know, so being able to interpret that and and action it quickly. If you've got a good policy writer, you know, who can interpret that regulation and put a policy that is actionable by the business more quickly, that's hugely valuable. Because it saves time, it saves money, and it allows you to transact quicker. That's a that that kind of consultative advisory skill set within compliance and the regulation side of compliance.
From my opinion is is is a really high growth, high impact kind of area that's coming as as as regulations in bed. Yeah. That's that's really interesting. But funny, you know, I spoke with one company recently, ComplyAI Pro or something like this. You have a way way do exactly this, understanding and regulations, translating this into compliance, and then -- Yeah. -- it's almost like you know, it's tricky with this. Right? Because well, it's tricky because it's it's open to interpretation. Yes. But at the same time, we don't know what's the AI that that that, you know, this type of models will tuckled first.
I think that the critical element, you know and correct me if I'm wrong, is that the human interaction That's not something that's gonna be replaced by, you know, technology. Right? This is, you know, me calling I the guy in in regulator in FCA, you know, like, give them a call. Like, I know how to speak to business to for them to get comfortable on what's happening. I know how to listen to them. You know, there's a soft studio issue. Are you crazy just doing it? Right? Yeah.
You don't want a computer or a machine emailing your biggest client and saying, we're gonna turn the taps off because you haven't sent us a passport. Right. True. Hundred hundred percent. Alright. You know, so what and where is the market you you think is gonna be growing the I mean, in terms of jurisdiction, the US, UK, everywhere. Everywhere. Everywhere. That sounds good. And and and and and and I mean everywhere. You know, we speak to, you know, there's times But I mean, it's a nice possible way. It's such a a big area. We had a client call to see the other day and said, okay.
We wanna open up an operation in Singapore in we're Singapore they're a Singaporean entity. We wanna open up, you know, an EMI business in Lithuania, and then we wanna pass for the license into the UK where where you can't do that. You know, Brexit has happened and and therefore that's so the just I think these are a incredibly smart company and incredibly smart people. But, you know, there's just this lack of knowledge and awareness of of compliance and regulation and what you can and can't do. And that's that the the with the regulatory focus, an actual regulation coming, it's a it's a explosion of of need. Coming.
And if you're not on top of it and ahead of it, like you say, the higher last you know, principle will really come and and and and hurt you, I think. I mean, one of the one of the indicator which I applied which I had in in traditional finance, but which I applied as a crypto is, you know, if firing its head arm. Let's put it in this way. If you have two big rotation in compliance team, especially in chief compliance area, something going on with the company. I think the only company which didn't follow this this this path is revoked. You know, based they had so many compliance and ABL officers, you know, changing.
And the business is still growing and it's still relevant. And I am, you know, possible. And as a company, you know, still client of them and, you know, keeping my money over there, which, you know, think when you think about the risk, it's actually increasing. So that's something which which I always, you know. So Like, if there's too man too much movement in compliance in AML, there's something going on. So Yeah. That that that that is there is and I agree with that, but it could also be for for good.
It could also be that there's there's there's an awareness that we need to we need to do better. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah. Yeah. Alright. Great. Alright. It's Mark. Thanks a lot for your time. Hey, Mark. It's been my pleasure today. Alright. Yeah. We'll be speaking soon. No doubt. Jeez. Crypto Compliance brought to you by gate knocks. .
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Skrybot. 2023, Video transcriptions from YouTube
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