The House Committee on Foreign Affairs Thursday unanimously approved a measure that would penalize foreign banks that offer financial services to Hezbollah, an Iran-backed, Lebanon-based Shiite militant group.
U.S. officials Tuesday charged a blacklisted Chinese national with using shell companies to maintain accounts at American banks and offered five million dollars for information on his whereabouts.
The financial clearing subsidiary of Deutsche Börse AG will pay the U.S. Treasury Department's sanctions enforcer $152 million for holding money in New York-based accounts on behalf of Iran's central bank.
As early as Monday, banks will be able to do what has become seemingly unthinkable in the sanctions compliance field during recent years: ramp up their ties to Iran.
The chairman of a Senate committee vowed Thursday to block additional sanctions against Iran in an effort to protect last month's multilateral accord to suspend portions of the country's nuclear program.
Western financial institutions won't radically amend their sanctions controls in response to an agreement to limit Iran's nuclear program in exchange for a relaxation of banking restrictions, say former officials.
Despite tightened controls on interbank messaging, some bankers looking to hide the role of their blacklisted clients in international wires need only type a single key on their keyboard, according to experts.
American sanctions enforcers will "primarily" focus in coming months on blacklisting Chinese firms that buy and resell defense industry or dual-use goods to Iran, a U.S. Justice Department official said Wednesday.
A U.S. official's threat last month of economic sanctions against four Chinese banks is likely to be toothless given economic and enforcement hurdles, say sanctions analysts.
The U.S. Treasury Department would have 90 days to issue regulations obligating banks to audit their correspondent relationships for possible ties to blacklisted Iranians, under a bipartisan bill reintroduced Wednesday.
Recent congressional disclosures and leaked diplomatic cables highlight the difficulties the United States faces in convincing even stalwart allies to enforce economic sanctions against Iran, say analysts.
China and other U.S. trading partners continue to provide Iran with energy and banking services five months after the passage of new comprehensive sanctions against the country, lawmakers said Wednesday.
At least 10 large domestic and international banks have dropped the accounts maintained for dozens of companies that sell agricultural and medical products to Iran through U.S. Treasury Department licenses.
Domestic banks and foreign financial institutions with U.S. branches are scrambling to comply with a tough new U.S. law and subsequent regulations designed to cripple the Iranian financial system, say analysts.
Businesses and individuals seeking to evade sanctions that target Iran and other nations may be utilizing back-to-back letters of credit to disguise their roles in transactions, say trade analysts.
The Council of the European Union agreed Monday to implement economic sanctions against Iran, including prohibitions on transactions involving Iranian banks and energy companies.
A Web site that purports to list the foreign correspondent relationships of many of Iran's financial institutions could cause U.S. institutions to rethink their ties to well-known international banks.
The U.S. Senate won't consider an Iran sanctions bill overwhelmingly approved by the U.S. House of Representatives Tuesday until a negotiation deadline set by the Obama administration expires, say analysts.
The head of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee will soon introduce a bill to broaden sanctions against financial institutions and other businesses tied to Iran and the country's nuclear ambitions.
UK-based institutions Barclays PLC and Lloyds TSB Bank both said last month that they were being investigated by the U.S. Justice Department and the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control for possible violations of sanctions against state sponsors of terror.