News
Proposed FinCEN Changes to SAR Format a Mixed Bag for Banks
By Brian Monroe
printA U.S. Treasury Department proposal to amend suspicious activity reporting forms could mean hundreds of thousands of dollars in one-off expenses for some financial institutions, even as the plan streamlines report filing. The Oct. 15 proposal by the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) would add pull-down window data fields to a new XML-based, "dynamic" suspicious activity report (SAR) form. The changes, which come as part of the bureau's IT modernization initiative, would not impose any new regulatory duties on financial institutions. Financial institutions of all sizes would incur training costs, and large financial institutions that batch file SARs via their...
TO READ THE FULL STORY
Subscribe
Learn More
Related News
The U.S. Treasury Department's financial intelligence unit fined a now-defunct New Jersey money transmitter $125,000 for repeatedly and willfully violating Bank Secrecy Act requirements.
Mexican officials will extend until February an upcoming deadline for nonbank companies to implement anti-money laundering controls, according to sources with knowledge of the matter.
Lawmakers should expand financial safe harbor protections to allow banks to better share their suspicions about money laundering and its predicate crimes, a top U.S. regulatory official said Sunday.
As a deadline for the implementation of electronic Bank Secrecy Act reporting approached earlier this month, hundreds of financial institutions questioned whether they had too little time to comply with the requirements.
The New York County District Attorney's Office is creating a financial intelligence unit in an effort to expand its use of Bank Secrecy Act reports, the agency's highest official said Monday.
The U.S. Treasury Department and Federal Reserve Board disclosed long-awaited enforcement actions against JPMorgan Chase for Bank Secrecy Act failures Monday - the same day the regulators punished the company for trading violations.
The Manhattan District Attorney's Office has opened dozens of financial crime investigations since the 2010 formation an internal team that reviews suspicious activity reports, a New York official said Monday.
It's a message that has been hammered home repeatedly by the U.S. Treasury Department: the confidentiality of data included in suspicious activity reports is sacrosanct.
Divergences in international lists of predicate offenses to money laundering have hampered the fight against financial criminals, according to a report by the Australian government.
The chief self-regulatory organization examining broker-dealers for anti-money laundering compliance is again allowed to have direct access to suspicious activity reports, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission confirmed Thursday.
Hundreds of banks and credit unions are likely to miss a June deadline to comply with federal rules mandating that they file all anti-money laundering regulatory reports electronically.
A Miami bank already on the hook with federal regulators for a lax compliance program was fined $7 million Thursday for failing to address multiple Bank Secrecy Act violations.
Countries should ease their privacy restrictions that hinder cross-border data-sharing on suspicious transactions, according to a Toronto-based intergovernmental group of financial intelligence units.
An effort by the country's financial intelligence unit to take ownership of Bank Secrecy Act data managed by the IRS appears to be on track, according to industry observers and the U.S. Treasury Department.
A former loss mitigation specialist at Chase Bank accepted $10,000 in bribes and illegally disclosed a suspicious activity report to the client it was filed on, a California jury said Monday.
Financial institutions must keep a tight lid on investigations of suspicious account activity, even when transactional alerts don't merit federal regulatory reporting, the U.S. Treasury Department said Tuesday.
A judges decision Tuesday to allow discussion of alleged suspicious activity at a Miami bank is likely to draw the attention of financial regulators, according to current and former examiners.
The U.S. Treasury Department's financial intelligence unit will unveil details in January of its Bank Secrecy Act database overhaul scheduled for completion in 2014.
Banks will receive fewer law enforcement data requests during the early stages of financial crime investigations as the result of new rules on cross-border transaction reporting, according to the head of the U.S. Treasury Department's financial intelligence unit.
The U.S. Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve issued separate enforcement actions Thursday against HSBC North America Holdings Inc. for systemic Bank Secrecy Act compliance violations.