https://co24.ca/canada-money-laundering/

The café on my street corner in Montreal changed hands three times last year. It never seems to have customers, yet somehow stays afloat with expensive renovations and new signage every few months. Perhaps it’s a legitimate business facing tough market conditions—or perhaps it’s one of countless Canadian enterprises serving as a front for something more sinister.

Money laundering in Canada isn’t just a financial crime—it’s become our national embarrassment. For years, Canada has earned the dubious international reputation as a “snow-washing” haven, where dirty money from around the globe comes to be cleansed through our real estate markets, casinos, and businesses. The scale is staggering: estimates suggest between $45 billion and $113 billion is laundered annually through Canadian channels.

This week, Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne announced yet another initiative to combat financial crimes, promising a coordinated approach between federal agencies and provincial partners. But haven’t we heard this before?

The core problem remains unchanged. Our anti-money laundering regime has been fragmented across multiple agencies with limited resources and coordination. While FINTRAC (Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada) collects vast amounts of suspicious transaction data, it lacks enforcement powers. The RCMP has enforcement authority but insufficient financial crime expertise. Meanwhile, provincial regulators operate in their own separate silos.

“The result is a system where everyone has a piece of the puzzle, but nobody can see the complete picture,” explained Christine Duhaime, a financial crime expert I spoke with last month at a CO24 Trends panel on economic security. “Money launderers exploit these gaps expertly.”

What makes this particularly frustrating is how clearly the solutions have been identified. The 2019 Cullen Commission in British Columbia—launched after Vancouver’s real estate and casino sectors became infamous for money laundering—produced comprehensive recommendations, most of which remain unimplemented. Similarly, a 2022 parliamentary committee provided a detailed roadmap for reform that continues to gather dust.

The impacts of this policy paralysis extend far beyond technical financial regulations. Money laundering has directly contributed to Canada’s housing affordability crisis by artificially inflating real estate values in major urban centers. It has facilitated drug trafficking operations that feed the opioid epidemic. It has undermined tax revenues and economic stability.

Perhaps most corrosively, it has fostered a culture of cynicism. When average Canadians struggle to afford housing while watching suspicious wealth flow unchecked through luxury real estate markets, it erodes faith in our institutions. This sentiment echoes through many of the CO24 Opinions submissions we’ve received from readers across the country.

Minister Champagne’s announcement does include some promising elements—particularly the commitment to creating a beneficial ownership registry that would reveal the true owners behind shell companies. But similar promises were made in 2019, 2021, and 2022. The perpetual cycle of announcements followed by inaction suggests a deeper problem: the political will to fundamentally disrupt entrenched financial interests simply isn’t there.

What would real reform look like? A single, properly resourced financial crimes agency with both intelligence and enforcement powers would be a start. Mandatory beneficial ownership transparency for all property and business transactions would close critical loopholes. Meaningful penalties—including actual prison terms for facilitators—would create genuine deterrence.

The cultural element matters too. For too long, Canada has maintained a peculiar national cognitive dissonance—priding ourselves on being “nice” while turning a blind eye to our role in global financial crime. Addressing this requires a shift in how we think about white-collar crime and its victims.

As I explore in an upcoming CO24 Culture series on Canadian identity paradoxes, we’ve become adept at maintaining polite fictions about ourselves. But the cost of these illusions grows more evident each year.

Will this time be different? The cynical view—supported by decades of ineffectual reforms—suggests we’re witnessing another performance of regulatory theater. But perhaps the cumulative pressure of multiple crises—housing affordability, organized crime, and damaged international reputation—will finally force meaningful action.

For Canadians watching from the sidelines, the question remains: how many more announcements will we endure before seeing genuine results in our neighborhoods, housing markets, and financial systems? The answer will reveal much about who truly holds power in modern Canada.