The financing of organised crime is a horizontal issue for all criminal markets, although it rarely falls in the focus of law enforcement agencies. The intelligence gathering of law enforcement agencies has traditionally been focused on uncovering the members of crime groups and tracing the illicit goods
or services. Financial transactions are traced mainly for the purposes of money laundering investigations, where the focus is on the proceeds and not on the investments related to the criminal activities. The reason for this is that currently criminal prosecution procedures in all Member States are entirely focused
on collecting evidence in regards to possession, transporting, manufacturing or sale of illicit products or services. Financing of organised crime is also often passed over in threat assessments and strategic analyses of organised crime.
