The United Kingdom-based Financial Conduct Authority has fined the UK subsidiary of the Guaranty Trust Bank over £500,000 for failing to complete thorough anti-money laundering checks on its potential clients from high-risk countries.
The FCA said on Friday that between May 2008 and July 2010, the financial institution had failed to assess potential money-laundering risks, screen customers against sanction lists, establish the objective of the accounts being opened inside their London branch or review the experience of “high risk” accounts, Reuters'report said.
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Guaranty Trust Bank opened a UK office in 2008 offering retail and wholesale banking to private and corporate clients, based on the regulator.
Specifically, the FCA said in a statement that it had levied a £525,000 fine on the UK subsidiary of the financial institution after it looked over the bank's systems within a greater review into anti-money laundering controls among banks.
The same report by the Financial Times quoted the regulator as saying that the financial institution wasn't rigorous enough in pressing potential customers on the sources of wealth.
This, it added, included not pressing a customer, who was simply a so-called politically exposed person “wanted by the UK authorities in experience of laundering an incredible number of dollars of embezzled public funds”, on the greatest supply of a cheque for £500,000 that he deposited from an offshore account, based on the regulator's final investigative report.
The regulator, however, declined to recognize the person, the report stated.
The Nigerian authorities in 2007 named GTB's parent bank, the initial African bank to list in London, as one of two banks utilized by the former Governor of Delta State, James Ibori, inside their money laundering investigation of him, by which he was acquitted.
Ibori was found guilty of money-laundering and fraud worth £50m this past year at Southwark Crown Court and sentenced to 13 years, following a separate investigation and prosecution by the UK authorities.
The UK regulator and its predecessor, the Financial Services Authority, have made anti-money laundering controls a priority in the last 2 yrs as tighter directives from Europe and new UK anti-bribery legislation took effect.
Reacting to the fine, Bloomberg quoted the Managing Director of GTB's UK unit, Mr. Ade Adebiyi, as saying, “We have fully co-operated with the FCA in its investigation and we've accepted the findings.”
Adebiyi, within an e-mailed statement, however said, “The FCA found no evidence that GTB UK did in reality handle any proceeds of crime.”
He explained the lapses occurred early in its put up in Britain and had since been addressed.
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