FIU removes notaries, advocates from AML guideline addressees

Estonia's Financial Intelligence Unit has redrawn the boundary of its anti-money-laundering risk-management and due-diligence guideline, narrowing how it speaks to notaries and advocates while keeping the substance of the duties on legal-services providers intactFIU.

The amended guideline removes notaries and advocates from the obliged-entity category in point 1.2.2.13.FIU That provision now names bailiffs, bankruptcy trustees, interim trustees and other legal-services providers acting in financial or real-estate transactions for a client, or advising on or executing transactions linked to real estate, companies and shares, client money and asset management, account opening and management, fund-raising for companies, and trusts, foundations and similar arrangements. The footnote that previously stated that the guideline's directions also applied to notaries and advocatesFIU now says only that the principles described in the guideline may be suitable for notaries and advocates in performing their obligations under the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Prevention Act (RahaPTS)FIU. This mirrors the statute's supervision split: the Estonian Bar Association's board supervises advocatesRiigiteataja, while the Ministry of Justice and Digital Affairs supervises notariesRiigiteataja and may delegate that task to the Chamber of Notaries, under RahaPTS § 64.

The Financial Intelligence Unit confirmed the guideline on 21 September 2026. Its target group is all obliged entities within the meaning of RahaPTS, and the 12 October 2026 amendmentsFIU clarify the provisions concerning the legal-services-provider sector in points 1.1.3, 1.2.2.13, 3.21.1, 4.19, 4.19.1 and 4.32.3. The listing page carrying the annotation was last updated on 15 October 2026.

The gatekeeper-role passage in point 3.21.1 no longer lists notaries among the professions the Financial Action Task Force assigns that role; it now names real-estate brokers, lawyers, accountants and trust and company service providers. In the risk-grading factors of point 4.32.3, advocates drop out of the examples of addressees for whom the volume of client assets or of an occasional transaction is relevant; financing institutions, real-estate brokers and auditors handling client-asset transactions remain.

The deferred-identification exception in point 4.19.1 now covers bailiffs, bankruptcy trustees, auditors and other legal-services providersFIU, no longer naming notaries and advocatesFIUFIU. They may identify and verify the client, the occasional-transaction participant and the beneficial owner during the establishment of the business relationship or the execution of the transaction where interrupting the normal course of professional activity must be avoided and the money-laundering or terrorist-financing risk is low, completing the measures within a reasonable time after first contact and before binding acts. The heading of section 4.19 drops advocates and notaries from its examples, naming bailiffs, bankruptcy trustees, sworn auditors and accounting-service providers instead.

Annex 1 loses the notary-specific red flags in points 1 and 3: transfers of ownership without clear economic logic and the use of representatives combined with activity in high-risk countries. The annex keeps the sector examples for real-estate brokers, trust and company service providers and currency-exchange services, and it drops remote identification in notarial practice from the communication-channel risks, alongside e-identification, automated systems and agents used by company service providers.

For compliance teams at law firms, bailiff offices, trustee practices, audit firms and accounting providers, the practical effect is editorial rather than deregulatoryFIU: the statutory duties under RahaPTS standFIU, but the Financial Intelligence Unit's detailed guidance no longer addresses notaries and advocates directlyFIU. Those two professions answer to their own supervisors for the same duties.FIU

Legal basis: Rahapesu ja terrorismi rahastamise riskide juhtimine ning hoolsusmeetmete kohaldamine Rahapesu Andmebüroo järelevalvatavatele kohustatud isikutele, points 1.2.2.13, 3.21.1, 4.19, 4.19.1 and 4.32.3 and annex 1, as amended on 12 October 2026; RahaPTS § 64 on supervisory authoritiesRiigiteataja.