Rogue Galleries: Tackling Illicit Finance in US Art Markets

Art can be valuable, highly portable, and difficult to trace—making it an ideal vehicle for concealing illicit wealth. The United States hosts the world’s largest and most dynamic art market, with tens of billions of dollars of sales taking place each year. But high-end art dealers’ associations with private wealth and their commitment to customer discretion have made the sector a magnet for money laundering and sanctions evasion. Drug cartels, Hezbollah financiers, and Russian oligarchs have all been caught exploiting the US art trade in recent years. Meanwhile, China’s emergence as a major art market has introduced new vectors of transnational crime and corruption. Yet the US art market remains largely exempt from anti–money laundering regulations—a loophole that a bipartisan group of legislators now seeks to close. Join Hudson Institute for an expert discussion on how policymakers, law enforcement, and the art industry can safeguard art markets from exploitation by bad actors and crack down on illicit finance.