Real Estate

Money mule fraud exposure hits P603B, peso rebounds

A joint white paper by IDfy Philippines and CIBI Information Inc. estimates P603 billion in annual fraud exposure from money mule accounts, while the peso recovers from a record low and the stock market braces for the central bank's rate decision and GCash's listing.

By the MMI Real Estate Desk

A white paper from a trust-technology firm and a credit-reporting agency put a number on one of the country's fastest-growing financial crimes: up to ₱603 billion a year in exposure to fraud routed through money mule accounts, drawn from 2025 payment data across the central bank's two real-time payment systems. The estimate landed the same weekend the peso clawed back from a record low against the dollar and the stock market headed into a week shaped by an expected interest-rate hike and the listing of the country's dominant e-wallet operator.

The mule study, "Mule Hunting: Are We Chasing Ghosts?", was released jointly by IDfy Philippines and CIBI Information Inc. and reported by The Manila Times and Head Topics. It describes accounts used to receive and move money obtained through digital scams — sometimes opened knowingly by the account holder, sometimes by people tricked into participating, sometimes taken over outright. IDfy country head Raghu Chandrasekhar said technology alone cannot solve the problem and called for public awareness alongside the safeguards required under the Anti-Financial Account Scamming Act, or Afasa, the law that obliges banks and e-wallet providers to police account takeovers and scam transactions. The same firm told the Daily Tribune it plans to expand into insurance and telecommunications client onboarding next year, building on work with more than 10 Philippine organizations including leading banks and thrift banks.

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