The head of Argentina’s anti-money laundering watchdog has filed a criminal complaint related to a firm that employs one of President Javier Milei’s top advisers was leaked to the press.
Paul Starc, the head of the Financial Information Unit (UIF) money-laundering agency, has called for an investigation to be opened about flagged money transactions at Zefico SA, a firm that employs Santiago Caputo, one of Milei’s top advisers, and how the information was made public.
The complaint was filed on August 13 in the afternoon before National Federal Criminal and Correctional Prosecutor’s Office No. 4 and federal prosecutor Carlos Stornelli. In the pleading, Starc asked the courts to investigate “the extremely serious events in question and to establish the criminal liability and its perpetrators.”
According to the complaint, on August 12, Starc received a communication through which it learned of the existence of an alleged leak of a “Suspicious Operation Report” (ROS, in Spanish). In the first paragraph of the pleading, the official highlighted that this type of information is “confidential” and is to be considered secret, as per National Law 25,246.
Starc learned of the leak hours before an article was published in La Nación about the suspicious money transactions at Zefico SA reported to UIF.
In his filing, the UIF official did not mention the company, but rather referred to “an entity allegedly reported by a banking institution.”
Only UIF officials and obligated parties have access to ROS reports. Starc subsequently ordered for the UIF’s Technology Directorate to prepare a report with the list of officials who had entered the financial intelligence system. The goal was to know who accessed the ROS in question to identify the person who disclosed the information.
The result, according to the complaint, brought no answers. That is why it was filed before the court system.
The leak reported by Starc has put Zefico SA under the microscope. As published by reporter Camila Dolabjian in La Nación, the firm was reported before the UIF after a series of suspicious operations amid possible asset-laundering.
The report was prepared on July 30 after a banking institution with which the company operates detected that between April and June 2025 some US$800,000 had gone into Zefico SA. It was the company’s first money transaction, whose sole employee is consultant Santiago Caputo.
The cash injection came through the sons of Pablo Costa, the head of the company who is a friend of the presidential advisor’s family.
Given the unusual transaction, the banking institution made a series of enquiries to Costa, his wife and children, who had supposedly donated the money. The inconsistencies in what was informed by the group made the body draft a suspicious operation report before the UIF.
– TIMES/PERFIL
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