A financial sector can be said to have integrity if it is sufficiently robust to ensure that abuses of the institutions that operate within the sector are detected and addressed through an appropriate response.

The products and services offered by institutions in the financial sector can be abused for a number of reasons such as to launder the proceeds of crime, to perpetrate fraud (either on the institutions themselves or their customers), to facilitate corruption, to make funds available for illicit purposes such as terrorism or the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, to evade taxes, to name but a few. The aim of measures to promote financial integrity is to ensure that when abuses of this nature occur, those are not tolerated or allowed to compete unfairly with the legitimate objectives that the sector is meant to serve.

A wide range of measures are put in place to protect the integrity of the financial sector and, by implication, of the institutions that operate within the sector. The fundamental building block of measures to promote integrity of the financial sector are those that bring transparency to the sector by requiring financial institutions to conduct proper due diligence on their customers and to capture and to maintain customer and transaction information in records that are accessible to supervisory and investigating authorities.

The Financial Services Board (FSB) oversees the South African non-banking financial services industry. The information and documents provided are specifically intended for the non-banking financial services companies.

Accountable institutions which fall under the Financial Services Board include:

A board of executors or a trust company or any other person that invests, keeps in safe custody, controls or administers trust property within the meaning of the Trust Property Control Act, 1988 (Act 57 of 1988).
A financial instrument trader as defined in the Financial Markets Control Act, 1989 (Act 55 of 1989).
A management company registered in terms of the Unit Trusts Control Act, 1981 (Act 54 of 1981).
A person who carries on a long-term insurance business' as defined in the Long-Term Insurance Act, 1998 (Act 52 of 1998), including an insurance broker and an agent of an insurer.
A person who carries on the business of dealing in foreign exchange.
A person who carries on the business of rendering investment advice or investment broking services, including a public accountant as defined in the Public Accountants and Auditors
Act, 1991 (Act 80 of 1991), who carries on such a business.
A person who has been approved or who falls within a category of persons approved by the Registrar of Financial Markets in terms of section 5 (1) (a) of the Financial Markets Control Act, 1989 (Act 55 of 1989).