General Course Information
1.1 Course details
| Course code: | LLAW6282 |
| Course name: | Financial Crime: Governance, Risk and Compliance |
| Programme offered under: | LLM Programme |
| Semester: | First |
| Prerequisites / Co-requisites: | No |
| Credit point value: | 9 credit |
| Cap on student numbers: | 50 |
1.2 Course description
A financial institution can be exposed to a wide array of liabilities and sanctions if involved in committing, or even facilitating the happening of, financial crime. Developing and maintaining a robust governance and internal control framework that can identify and manage potential financial crime risks in a timely manner is essential to enabling the financial institution compliance with the applicable laws and regulations in this area.
This course aims to develop the students conceptual and practical understanding of financial crime risks with a focus on a financial institution setting. In particular, this course will examine how the legal and regulatory regime (including both criminal law and financial services regulations) tackles abusive practices of financial crimes. Besides examining the rules/regulations and roles of enforcement agencies in the context of Hong Kong, examples from international and overseas practices will also be discussed for comparative purposes. Throughout this course, the perspectives of different stakeholders, such as employees, shareholders, directors, enforcement agencies / regulators, and the general public, will also be taken into consideration.
This course is broadly divided into two parts. In the first part, a selection of financial crimes will be examined (e.g., fraud, bribery/corruption, insider dealing and market abuse, financial/trade sanctions, money laundering).[1] As part of this analysis, for each financial crime, the relevant legal offences and regulatory provisions (including case law, where applicable), enforcement authorities and processes, and liabilities will be examined. In the second part, the focus will be on how financial institutions manage financial crime risk in practice, such as the different components in a sound governance and internal control framework and division of management and operational responsibilities. Practical challenges from an industry practitioner perspective and market best practices will also be discussed throughout this course. Some of the topical and upcoming trends in this area, including the role and impact of technology as well as the regulators focus and expectations on financial institutions, will also be highlighted.
In addition to regular lectures, students will be given an opportunity to deliver a group presentation and be expected to participate in in-class discussions on different topics, case studies, and court cases. Where appropriate, practitioners in the relevant field will be invited to share with students their experience and insights on how different financial crime compliance issues come into play and are being detected/handled in practice.
[1] Several hot topics on money laundering will be discussed in this course. Note, there is a separate course (LLAW6256) being offered in the second semester that will cover this subject matter in greater detail.
1.3 Course teachers
| Name | E-mail address | Office | Consultation | |
| Course convenor | John Lee | jcml@hku.hk | N/A | By email |
| Course convenor | Henry Yu | letpen@hku.hk | N/A | By email |
Learning Outcomes
2.1 Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs) for this course
CLO 1 Describe and explain the key financial crime risks in financial institutions and how they have evolved over time.
CLO 2 Describe and explain the different law and regulations on different types of financial crimes, as applicable to financial institutions.
CLO 3 Demonstrate an understanding of the roles and objectives of different local, regional, and international bodies in detecting and deterring financial crimes.
CLO 4 Demonstrate an understanding of how a financial institution designs its governance and internal control framework in order to detect, manage, and mitigate potential financial crime risks in practice.
2.2 LLM Programme Learning Outcomes (PLOs)
Please refer to the following link: https://course.law.hku.hk/llm-plo/
2.3 Programme Learning Outcomes to be achieved in this course
| PLO A | PLO B | PLO C | PLO D | PLO E | PLO F | |
| CLO 1 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 2 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 3 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 4 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Assessment(s)
3.1 Assessment Summary
| Assessment task | Due date | Weighting | Feedback method* | Course learning outcomes |
| Group presentation | Class 6-10 | 20% | 3 | 1, 2, 3, 4 |
| Take home exam | 4 Dec 2023 | 80% | 1, 3 | 1, 2, 3, 4 |
| *Feedback method (to be determined by course teacher) | |
| 1 | A general course report to be disseminated through Moodle |
| 2 | Individual feedback to be disseminated by email / through Moodle |
| 3 | Individual review meeting upon appointment |
| 4 | Group review meeting |
| 5 | In-class verbal feedback |
3.2 Assessment Detail
To be advised by course convenor(s).
3.3 Grading Criteria
Please refer to the following link: https://www.law.hku.hk/_files/law_programme_grade_descriptors.pdf
Learning Activities
4.1 Learning Activity Plan
| Seminar | 3 hours / week for 12 teaching weeks |
| Private study time: | 9.5 hours / week for 12 teaching weeks |
Remarks: the normative student study load per credit unit is 25 ± 5 hours (ie. 150 ± 30 hours for a 6-credit course), which includes all learning activities and experiences within and outside of classroom, and any assessment task and examinations and associated preparations.
4.2 Details of Learning Activities
To be advised by course convenor(s).
Learning Resources
5.1 Resources
| Reading materials: | There is no prescribed textbook for this course. The course lecturers will recommend reading materials (e.g., journal articles, court cases) from time to time. Details of such materials will be made available on the course Moodle as far as possible. Students are also encouraged to keep abreast of the latest financial crime news and developments through reading any sources accessible to them (e.g., newspapers, trade publications, academic journals) as well as to share them with the course lecturers and fellow students. |
5.2 Links
Please refer to the following link: http://www.law.hku.hk/course/learning-resources/