BAMC's programme for corruption prevention received the Ethic Intelligence's certificate of compliance in 2015, BAMC said earlier this week. The full Anti-corruption Compliance System Certificate followed this autumn after an intensive several-month programme.

The bad bank said only companies with high level of business integrity, transparency and conflict of interest prevention on all levels obtained the certificate.

The head of Ethic Intelligence, Philippe Montigny, told the STA that BAMC was the only bank asset management company to have applied for the certificate so far and won it.

In the banking sector, a similar certificate was recently conferred on French bank Credit Agricole.

He said that most banks and financial corporations directed their resources into the prevention of money laundering while often underestimating the risks of corruption. However, increasingly many financial institutions now devote more attention to this issue as well.

BAMC, which started the process to get a certificate in the field of battle against corruption back in 2014, was in a way a pioneer in this field, Montigny said.

According to Dejan Jasnič of ABC Transparency, which conducts the corruption prevention programme in Slovenia, told the STA that the review had assessed corruption risks and BAMC's anti-corruption system based on four criteria.

These are raising awareness on the anti-corruption programme, educational activities in the battle against corruption, tools and protocols for prevention and detection of corruption risks and a system of control and improvements of the anti-corruption programme.

Commenting on the fact that BAMC is often criticised by the media and the public for being non-transparent, non-economical and even corruptive, Montigny said that companies decided for the anti-corruption programme if they notice some risks but those which apply for the independent certification process really want to address these issues and with to follow the best international practices in the field.

He believes the certificate demonstrated BAMC's serious commitment to business integrity.

Montigny said talks were under way with several other Slovenian companies which want to start the certification process.

Montigny, a founder of Ethic Intelligence, is a former member of the OECD Secretary General's office.