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Third-Party Payment Processors Key to Offshore Bank Fraud, Laundering Case
By Brian Monroe
printThe sentencings today of two men, purportedly smooth talkers who lived lavish lifestyles on other people's money, closes the book on an eight-year investigation into an offshore fraud and money laundering scam that involved the bilking of more than $200 million from investors. In March, Oregon residents Laurent Barnabe and Douglas Ferguson pled guilty in U.S. District Court in Oregon to money laundering charges in connection with a Ponzi scheme run through the First International Bank of Grenada (FIBG) – an institution with few assets, controls or accounting procedures, according to Justice Department documents. U.S. District Court Judge Garr King...
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In a rare gesture last week, a federal regulator signaled to banks that they might relax when it comes to implementing certain anti-money laundering policies. There was only one problem: no one is likely to listen.
New York City investigators are concerned that several start-up companies selling mobile payment products may be giving criminals an easy means to defraud banks and individuals.
Faced with raised compliance expectations, many large financial institutions are expanding the types of corporate clients they ask to implement anti-money laundering controls to include import-export businesses, payroll companies and payday lending firms.
Less than 10 percent of banks have joined their efforts to fight fraud and money laundering despite calls by the U.S. financial intelligence unit to do so, according to an upcoming report.
Finding themselves locked out of some large U.S. banks because of compliance concerns, third-party payment processors are increasingly turning to small- and mid-sized institutions for financial services, say consultants.
For many, the question of whether it's easier to anonymously form a shell company in a Group of 20 country or a blacklisted tax haven will seem to have an obvious answer. Many would be wrong, however, according to a recent study.
U.S. investigators arrested the former chief executive officer of a Manhattan-based bank Monday for allegedly embezzling money from a fraudulent loan and attempting to cheat the government out of federal bailout funds.
Massive spending to support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has been accompanied by a surge in fraud, corruption and money laundering involving military personnel and contractors.
The formation of a federal task force aimed at fighting financial crime will likely mean more money laundering investigations at banks, according to a U.S. Treasury Department official.
Antigua's efforts to end its reputation as a crime haven have suffered following the disclosure that the alleged head of an $8 billion fraud helped craft the country's anti-money laundering regime.
New Year's Eve may have come and gone and all of the post-celebration headaches faded, but financial institutions are going to need many more months to recover from 2008.
Banks that improperly handle government money, including bailout funds and taxes, could increasingly receive hefty fines under a law rarely evoked today in the financial sector, say legal experts.
The investigation into a $50 billion securities fraud by a former chairman of the Nasdaq stock market may mean more scrutiny for banks that took him as a client, according to a financial investigator.
White collar crime prosecutions in August have dropped nearly 20 percent in the past five years and nearly three percent since 2007, according to government data compiled by a Syracuse University organization.
A federal warning about the compliance risks of payment processors tied to telemarketers will mean closer scrutiny of the companies but not a wholesale dropping of the accounts, say consultants.
Banks should streamline their compliance efforts by coordinating their anti-money laundering and anti-fraud programs, the director of the United States' financial intelligence unit said Tuesday.
When financial institutions suspect an employee of fraud or abuse often their first instinct is to simply file a suspicious activity report with regulators and move to the next issue. But a SAR should be filed only after the financial institution has contacted law enforcement directly, experts say.
Individuals and businesses with bank accounts in the United States being pursued by foreign governments as tax cheats could face money laundering charges in the U.S., lawyers say.
With the Justice Department and SEC taking a more aggressive approach to enforcing the act, there has been a dramatic increase in investigations and enforcement actions, lawyers and compliance professionals say. Many of the violations are associated with money laundering cases.
U.S. Army Major John Cockerham made a lot of money selling his influence as a contracting officer to guarantee contractors would win government bids, according to federal investigators. But he was tripped up by his efforts to launder $9.6 million in bribes, authorities say.