OPINION Public money that disappears without being missing

In the middle of this week, I attended an event dedicated to combating online fraud, organized by a commercial bank in partnership with the National Directorate for Cyber Security and the Romanian Police, an event in which I found that banks are more interested than the state in the route of payments made by their clients.

Unfortunately, the Romanian state has reached a remarkable administrative performance: money can disappear without being missing, can be replaced without being found and can reappear in the accounting without ever returning. If the balance is correct on the date of the control, the institutions breathe a sigh of relief. What has happened in the meantime seems to be related to literature, not financial control.

For example, there are people who practice liberal professions and for whose services the state, through the Treasury, pays them a monthly amount of money, through the companies they own. In some cases, such as in the healthcare sector, the amounts are left to accumulate and are usually withdrawn at the end of the calendar or fiscal year.

However, one of these people, who is also the administrator of the company in question, decided two years ago to transfer the lei equivalent of 12,000 euros to the company's account and, instead of using the money for the company's activity, "invested" it through a Facebook page.

Facebook is, of course, the ideal place for such financial decisions: between an advertisement for miracle pills and a photo of a cat, the "investment of a lifetime" appears, with guaranteed profit and unnecessary checks. The money is sent, the investment turns out to be fictitious, and the 12,000 euros disappear into the pockets of the scammers.

The administrator did not notify the Police, the National Directorate for Cyber Security or the Prosecutor's Office. A complaint could have triggered the uncomfortable question: where did the money come from and under what conditions was it used? The victim of the scam feared that, once the investigation began, the state would not limit itself to identifying the scammers, but would also investigate the conduct of the scammer. Silence thus became his insurance policy.

In the following months, the person collected the equivalent of the 12,000 euros and deposited them in the company's bank account. The money did not return to the Treasury. It remained in the company, so that, in a possible audit by ANAF, the administrator could claim that he withdrew the amount, but did not spend it. The statement shows that the money exists. However, it is no longer the original money: that ended up with the scammers. The balance was reconstituted with other funds, and the accounting appearance was repaired before any institution noticed the hole.

The withdrawal of money, its loss, and subsequent replacement do not become nonexistent just because the amount appears again in the account. Covering the damage may have legal consequences, but it does not erase the trail of the funds, nor does it retrospectively transform an adventure on Facebook into a legitimate operation of the company.

However, it should be noted that any payment made by the state does not automatically remain "public money” after it enters the beneficiary's assets. If the amount represents the final payment for services actually provided and does not have an imposed destination, one cannot automatically speak of defrauding the public budget. However, there could be problems regarding the management of the company's assets, the justification of the operation, the accounting records, the use of money for personal interest, and compliance with tax obligations. If the funds had a special destination, were subject to regularization, or could be requested back, their use in a fictitious investment could have much more serious consequences. The verdict is given by the documents, not assumptions.

However, the case raises another question: can such a mechanism be used to introduce money of unclear origin into the company? If the administrator can explain a deposit by saying that he "replaced” a previously withdrawn amount, the reconstitution of the balance could become a front for funds from other sources. Not every such operation is money laundering. For this offense to exist, the criminal origin of the funds and the conduct intended to hide or disguise their origin must be proven. But it is precisely this origin that should be verified.

If the amount was restored from licit and declared income, we have a hidden loss and possible accounting or management irregularities. If the money deposited later does not have a verifiable origin, the problem changes radically. "I put the money back” is not a supporting document or a certificate of good financial behavior.

Banks monitor transactions and may request explanations or documents for unusual operations, but neither the banking system nor the Treasury offers a guarantee that each circuit is legitimate. Vulnerability arises from the fragmentation of control: the Treasury sees the payment, the bank sees the transfer, the accountant receives the administrator's explanations, ANAF checks the declarations, and the Police or DNSC do not know about scam because it is not claimed. Each institution owns a piece, but no one assembles the picture.

The state checks the final photo and ignores the film. If the amount exists on the day of the control, it rarely asks if it is the same money, where the original money disappeared, how the loss was recorded and from what income the balance was restored. This is how the paradise of irregularity is born: not by breaking the system, but by using the empty spaces between institutions.

The circuit becomes almost perfect. The state pays, the administrator "invests", the fraudster collects, the administrator keeps quiet and restores the amount, the company displays a reassuring balance, and the institutions find that everything is fine. Reality says that the original money has disappeared. The papers say that the amount is in the account. And the Romanian state, when it has to choose between reality and papers, remains consistent: it prefers papers.