$2 Trillion Moved and Now Banks Resist Money Laundering Orders

According to the ICIJ journalist, BuzzFeed shared some documents disclosing the attitude of financial institutions of New York City regarding money laundering. 

Over the past two decades, US officials were warned about moving money for money laundering orders. The reports say that some of the institutions did not step back after the warnings. From 1999 till 2017, approximately $2 trillion were illicitly moved, and the transactions were flagged by the banks’ internal compliance officers as possible laundering cases or some other crime. However, no action was taken by the higher authorities. 

Deutsche Bank topped the list, disclosing $1.3 trillion of unusual transactions in the files. The other one is JPMorgan Chase, which disclosed $514 billion. The reports further state that HSBC Holdings, Standard Chartered Plc, and Bank of New York Mellon Corp are the secondary banks involved in this case. 

Read more about banks and money laundering: Jobs in the frame for money laundering.

According to Tom Cardamone, managing director of Global Financial Integrity, the authorities must do better in closing the accounts involved in this activity upon receiving multiple reports for suspicious activities. 

These reports from BuzzFeed were revealed on Sunday that shed light on the financial institutions’ faulty system that the internal reports don’t get a follow-up. Furthermore, it risks other banks that paid $20 billion between 2012 and 2015 for not having any strict controls for money laundering, assisting clients to violate the US sanctions. 

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