Despite this being an obvious question, there is no simple or generally accepted answer! However, a document published last month by Centro de Estudios Sociales y de Opinión Pública de la Cámara de Diputados (CESOP), entitled Lavado de dinero: indicadores y acciones de gobierno binacionales (“Money Laundering: bi-national indicators and government actions”) does offer some clues and estimates.
For example, according to Mexico’s tax authorities (SHCP), the nation’s financial system “gained” at least 10 billion dollars last year from unrecorded, presumably illicit, activities such as drug trafficking. North of the border, the US State Department believes that money laundering in Mexico accounts for between 8 billion and 25 billion dollars a year, while figures as high as 29 billion dollars have been offered in the US Congress.
Financial models developed by Global Financial Integrity and Columbia University in the City of New York suggest that the total “gains” from all forms of illegal activities in the USA are about 196 billion dollars (1.36% of US GDP), and that about 90% of this amount is laundered each year. The same models, applied to Mexico, suggest total crime-related profits of 38 billion dollars (3.6% of Mexico’s GDP), only 10-14 billion dollars of which is laundered into the formal economy.
If the models are to be believed, in the USA, 46% of the total amount laundered derives from drug trafficking, 32% from people trafficking, 15% from pirated goods and 7% from fraud. In Mexico, 41% of laundered money originates from drugs, 33% from people trafficking, 20% from pirated goods and 6% from fraud.
Despite the considerable variation in numbers, most of the figures and calculations fall within, or close to, the range of values (between 2 and 5% of global GDP) that is estimated by the International Monetary Fund to be laundered each year around the world.
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