The U.S. Justice Department is investigating possible anti-money laundering compliance infractions related to how MoneyGram oversees agents working near Mexico's border, say current and former government sources.
The U.S. Treasury Department is in the final stages of levying a $12,000 civil money penalty against a New Jersey-based money remitter for failing to register as a money services business.
The division of investigatory and enforcement powers between two U.S. Treasury Department agencies has resulted in few monetary penalties for anti-money laundering compliance lapses by money services businesses and tension between the two agencies, say current and former government officials.
For money transmitters, proving to a bank that your company isn't too big of an anti-money laundering risk to take on can be difficult, even more so when you've encountered compliance problems.
The former owner of a Chilean money services business was sentenced to 42 months in prison and ordered to forfeit $10 million Thursday for sending remittances without state licenses.
The U.S. Justice Department entered into 60 percent fewer pre-trial agreements with corporations seeking to avoid criminal prosecutions in 2008 than in the previous year, according to a study released Friday.
El Noa Noa Corp. agreed to pay U.S. regulators $12,000 to settle charges that it failed to file dozens of currency transaction reports and repeatedly ignored warnings to adopt a written anti-money laundering program.
Successfully policing all the underlying agents participating in the $100-billion a year global money remittance market could require more government oversight, compliance professionals said.
By targeting Sigue Corp. rather than the affiliated agents where alleged money laundering took place, the Justice Department "squandered a golden opportunity" to go after the element of the MSB industry that presents the greatest laundering risks, an AML consultant says.
U.S. authorities have unfairly escalated the penalties for Bank Secrecy Act violations by overusing criminal proceedings in cases that should be considered civil matters to be solved by regulators, legal professionals say.
The settlement, which involves a $15 million forfeiture and a $9.7 million commitment to upgrade anti-money laundering procedures, will be included in a deferred prosecution agreement that could be issued as early as next week, people familiar with the matter said.