Money laundering

The Financial Conduct Authority has fined a U.K. unit of HSBC Holdings 64 million pounds ($85 million) after finding “serious weaknesses” in the automated processes it used to monitor suspicious transactions, the latest example of the watchdog’s increasingly assertive stance against the firms it regulates.

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network proposed standards to determine which companies must report their beneficial owners under a law enacted in January. Banks hope the new requirements will free them of the burden of collecting true-owner information about their customers.

The regulator has a policy that allows it to convert public enforcement actions into informal, nonpublic ones in cases where banks haven't fully met their obligations. Its inspector general says that the practice may give a false impression to customers and investors.

The bank was fined $150 million for anti-money-laundering violations because it missed — or ignored — numerous red flags in its dealings with the convicted sex offender. Here's what it should have done differently.

NatWest Group could face a fine of several hundred million pounds from the U.K.’s financial watchdog after pleading guilty to three criminal charges of money laundering.

Banks are traditionally the target of anti-money-laundering regulations and law enforcement’s efforts to crack down on illicit finance. As the cryptocurrency sector grows, policymakers may subject it to customer identification requirements and other measures, analysts say.

Tech companies that help banks detect money laundering have raised hundreds of millions of dollars in recent months because of advances in their products. Observers suggest the vendors will have to diversify their offerings to survive in a crowded field.

Congress had been close to passing legislation to help banks serve cannabis firms. Now Democratic leaders have all but abandoned the effort, prioritizing a riskier proposal to decriminalize the drug.

The cloud-based software vendor has completed a $10 million funding round through BlackFin Capital Partners and Picus Capital.

The Biden administration wants financial institutions to tell the government more about their customers to help the IRS thwart wealthy tax evaders. But critics say the plan could threaten account data security and the privacy of even low-income consumers.

Six Clovers, a digital payments company founded by two former PayPal developers, designed its Rapid platform to enable fast cross-border transactions using cryptocurrencies backed by government-issued money.

The data analytics provider has deployed cloud hosting to scour international payments for signs of fraud and money laundering.

Prosecutors say Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards leaked over 50,000 documents, including 2,000 suspicious activity reports, related to payments involving former President Donald Trump's 2016 campaign chairman.

While the eventual emergence from lockdown will help ease the pressure on overworked compliance departments, there is still an obvious need for tools that will make the anti-money laundering process simpler and stress-free, says SmartSearch's Martin Cheek.

The visibility of automated transactions provides a clear view of the flow of transactions, says Hummingbird's Joe Robinson.

Wall Street firms have urged the Biden administration to ease the industry’s burden in complying with a flood of financial sanctions the U.S. has levied in recent years as a primary tool of foreign policy toward Russia, China, Iran and other adversaries.

Without rollbacks of existing anti-money-laundering reporting requirements, a measure designed to make Bank Secrecy Act enforcement more risk-focused would do little to ease banks' regulatory burden.

Without rollbacks of existing anti-money-laundering reporting requirements, a measure designed to make Bank Secrecy Act enforcement more risk-focused would do little to ease banks' regulatory burden.

The 2020 elections buoyed hopes that Congress would finally make it easier for financial institutions to serve cannabis businesses. But Democrats’ push to decriminalize marijuana — a nonstarter for most Republicans — threatens the more targeted effort.

Transaction fraud and money laundering are typically siloed areas within banks, but both require a keen eye to finding the right patterns.