The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said Thursday that it fined Pacific National Bank in Miami $7 million for violating anti-money-laundering rules.
The $355 million-asset unit of Banco del Pacifico SA violated a consent order issued by the OCC in December 2005, largely dealing with how it implemented and complied with the Bank Secrecy Act, the OCC charged.
Pacific National "took some necessary steps to improve its BSA compliance" along with the regulations and the order, the OCC said, but "fell short of what was required." The OCC and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network pointed to a failure to implement adequate internal controls in monitoring and reporting suspicious activities, including its foreign correspondent bank accounts. Pacific National was also accused on not performing adequate due diligence or auditing high-risk areas appropriately.
Banco del Pacifico SA is owned by the Central Bank of Ecuador. The Fincen order said that 85% of Pacific National's customers are from Ecuador. The bank filed 421 initial suspicious activity reports totaling $577 million from January 2007 to July 2010 but Fincen said many of the reports were filed late.
The bank consented to paying a penalty to the Treasury Department without admitting or denying the allegations.
