The Global Financial Integrity report places Costa Rica and Panama in positions 14 and 18 in the list of countries that moved the largest flows of illegal money in the world between 2003 and 2012.

The report entitled “Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries: 2003-2012” by Global Financial Integrity, said that between those years, the flow of illicit money in Costa Rica exceeded $94 billion, about $30 billion more than the amount accumulated between 2001 and 2011, according to reports from the same institution in mid-2013.

In the same period in question, from 2003 to 2012, illicit cash flow in Panama totaled $48 billion.

In order to interpret the numbers representing illicit money involved in these two Central American countries, as reported by the company, you just have to compare this data with those of a much larger economy, such as Mexico, where illegal money flows amounted, in the same period, to $514 billion.

In the case of Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala, for example, Global Financial Integrity notes that in the ten years of analysis flows of illicit money in these countries amounted to $32 billion, $15 billion, $7.8 billion and $11.7 billion, respectively.

The most serious aspect of this situation is that, far from decreasing, the movement of illegal money continues to grow rapidly in the region.

Read the full report “Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries: 2003-2012“.