Australia’s embattled money transfer and currency exchange industry is warning that up to 25,000 jobs will be lost before the end of the month as remittance companies across Australia are forced to close.

The regulatory crackdown on terrorism funding and money laundering has caused the major banks to axe banking services to around 4500 money transfer providers.

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Ramanathan Karuppiah, a spokesman for the Australian Remittance and Currency Providers Association, said thousands of money transfer companies would go broke in a few weeks when Westpac ends banking relationships with the industry.

“Businesses are about to go bankrupt because the major banks are no longer providing transaction accounts to us,” he told The New Daily.

“We need those accounts to make international transfers.”

Mr Karuppiah, who operates money transfer businesses in Queensland and the Northern Territory, said moves at the forthcoming G20 conference to cut fees in the industry were meaningless because most providers in the industry would not survive.

He called on the federal government to address the looming collapse of the sector.

A meeting between the remitters association and the anti-money laundering regulator AUSTRAC are due to be held in Sydney on November 17.

Australians sent $US 5 billion overseas via money transfer companies in 2012, according to the World Bank.