Sanctions Evasion Reference

Trade misinvoicing

Deliberately misstating the price, quantity or description of goods on trade documents so that the value recorded differs from the value actually exchanged.

also known as

misinvoicing

reviewed

2026-08-20

Misinvoicing is the most-documented trade-based technique because it leaves a paper record that can be checked against an independent one. If an invoice says a consignment of pumps is worth two hundred thousand dollars and the market says the same pumps are worth two million, the difference has gone somewhere, and the direction of the error tells you which way value moved.

Global Financial Integrity’s published methodology, and the mirror statistics approach it uses, treat systematic gaps between paired country reports as the aggregate footprint of this behaviour.

Where this term is used

  • What is HS code misclassification? — Declaring goods under a Harmonised System commodity code that does not describe them, so that they attract the wrong duty, escape a licence requirement, or disappear from the statistics that would show them.
  • What is price cap attestation fraud? — Providing a false or unsupported statement that oil was bought at or below a capped price, so that shipping, insurance and financing services remain available for a cargo that does not qualify.
  • What is trade misinvoicing? — Trade misinvoicing is misstating the price, quantity or description of goods on trade documents, so that value moves across a border in a direction and an amount the paperwork does not admit.

Related terms

  • Over-invoicing — Stating a price above the true value of goods on an invoice, so that the importer transfers more value to the exporter than the trade justifies.
  • Under-invoicing — Stating a price below the true value of goods, so that value is retained abroad or duty and export restrictions are reduced.
  • Mirror statistics — Comparing what one country reports exporting to a partner with what the partner reports importing from it, treating persistent gaps as evidence of misreporting.
  • Trade-based money laundering — Moving value by misrepresenting the price, quantity or quality of goods in international trade, so that the transfer appears as ordinary commerce.

Sources

  1. Trade-Based Money Laundering: Trends and Developments. Financial Action Task Force and Egmont Group, 2020.
  2. Trade Misinvoicing. Global Financial Integrity, 2024.

All glossary terms