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March 31, 2011

WSJ: Vatican seeks to clamp down on its finances

by Stacy Meichtry
The Wall Street Journal

VATICAN CITY -- The Vatican is scrambling ahead of a Friday deadline to finalize new rules for how the Holy See will monitor the movement of funds in and out of Vatican walls and punish money launderers.

Pope Benedict XVI late last year bowed to the demands of the international financial community and said the Vatican would create a watchdog to police its bank's opaque finances and bring to justice anyone who commits financial misdeeds on Vatican territory. As the watchdog formally comes into power on Friday, regulators and banks in Italy and abroad will be watching closely to see if the new measures have teeth.

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