Banks Frown Over Another ICIJ Data Leak, Say Industry Has Moved On

Tom Burroughes

21 September 2020

A raft of global banks have hit back at a report claiming that ($504 billion); ($166 billion); ($64.1 billion); ($21 billion), ($8.5 billion) and , at $4.48 billion). A number of other players, including Denmark’s .

"8. But for the avoidance of doubt, we believe that we have complied with all our legal and regulatory obligations including in relation to US sanctions. We would also refer you to the report by the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee of Investigations entitled The Art Industry and US Policies that Undermine Sanctions, published on July 29, 2020. That report covers many of the issues raised in your letter and highlights the extensive investigative work undertaken by Barclays, and also our significant cooperation with relevant authorities."

BNY Mellon was quoted by Buzzfeed as saying: “BNY Mellon takes its role in protecting the integrity of the global financial system seriously, including filing Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs). As a trusted member of the international banking community, we fully comply with all applicable laws and regulations, and assist authorities in the important work they do. By law, we cannot comment on any alleged SAR we may have filed or that may have been illegally disclosed by third parties to the media.”

HSBC told FWR: “We do not comment on suspicious activity reporting. All of the information provided by the ICIJ is historic and predates the conclusion of our Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA) in 2017.

"Starting in 2012, HSBC embarked on a multi-year journey to overhaul its ability to combat financial crime across more than 60 jurisdictions. During that period, the Monitor fulfilled his role of identifying issues and making recommendations for improvement, and concluded that HSBC became a safer bank each year as a result of the bank’s efforts. At the end of 2017, the Justice Department, having received all of the Monitor’s reports, determined that HSBC met all of its obligations under the DPA. HSBC is a much safer institution than it was in 2012.”

“In 2012, we launched our Global Standards initiative, which focused on putting in place the most effective standards to combat financial crime across our operations globally. As part of this effort, we designed and implemented new, globally consistent policies on AML and sanctions that often extend beyond the requirements of local laws and regulations. Among other steps, we hired experienced senior personnel to lead the effort and significantly increased our financial crime compliance capabilities; we put in place a robust investigations capability; we improved and expanded our financial crime compliance training initiatives; and we upgraded or replaced key compliance IT systems, with over $1 billion spent since 2015. We also increased the number of staff in our financial crime compliance function from a few hundred in 2012 to around 5,000 in 2017. In parallel with our reforms, we dramatically reduced our financial crime risk profile, exiting jurisdictions, curtailing business in other jurisdictions and closing the accounts of existing customers.

"The goal of any financial crime compliance program is to detect and prevent financial crime. One way we do that is through transaction monitoring and sanctions screening. Each month, we screen over 689 million transactions across 236 million accounts for signs of money laundering and financial crime. In addition, we screen approximately 131 million customer records and 40 million transactions monthly for sanctions exposures. During 2019, we filed almost 50,000 suspicious activity reports to law enforcement and regulatory authorities where we identified potential financial crime,” it added.