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Danske Bank Admits US Bank Fraud Conspiracy

Danske Bank, Denmark’s largest lender by assets, must forfeit $2.1 billion after pleading guilty in New York on Tuesday to routing tens of billions of dollars of “criminal and suspicious” funds through the U.S. financial system from 2008 to 2016.

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan said in a statement that Danske Bank knew by February 2014 that Russian and other non-resident clients were using Danske Bank Estonia, the lender’s now-shuttered branch in the Baltics, to move money of suspicious and even criminal origin through U.S. banks.

Instead of taking steps to address significant problems with Danske Bank Estonia’s anti-money laundering and transaction-monitoring programs, Danske Bank chose to conceal them by lying to U.S financial institutions, prosecutors said.

Danske Bank also agreed to pay a $179 million penalty to settle parallel proceedings brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission, which accused the lender of “misleading” investors and failing to apprise them of the risk that Danske Bank Estonia’s AML shortcomings posed to them.

Moneylaundering.com may update this coverage as more information becomes available.
Topics : Anti-money laundering
Source: U.S.: Department of Justice
Document Date: December 13, 2022