Banks With Checking Accounts

Banks With Checking Accounts

  BNP Paribas file is part of a change in strategy of American justice, which should lead to the questioning of other large banks and financial intermediaries but also by other economic actors smaller.

  Two other major French banks, Societe Generale and Credit Agricole, Deutsche Bank and the Mexican subsidiary Banamex Citigroup are among the establishments investigated for alleged money laundering or alleged violation of the sanctions, according to sources familiar with the matter.

  The Department of Justice and other agencies, including the Manhattan District Attorney, investigate Société Générale and Crédit Agricole to determine whether the two banks violated U.S. economic sanctions against countries such as Iran, Cuba and Sudan , said one of the sources.

  Both banks said they were considering whether they had violated U.S. sanctions. Société Générale had reported in its latest annual report, she discussed with the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the Treasury Department regarding possible violations.

Société Générale and Crédit Agricole have declined to comment Tuesday.

  Another source said that a division of the Department of Justice is conducting a thorough investigation into whether Banamex had failed to control transfers of money passing through the border between the USA and Mexico. Citigroup said it was cooperating with an investigation in which the deposit insurance agency (Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., FDIC) is also involved.

A spokesman for Citigroup declined to comment.

LARGE FILES 

  Citigroup survey itself into alleged fraud on $ 565 million loan from Banamex and has thanked a dozen employees.

  Deutsche Bank is also under investigation for alleged infringement penalties but we do not know at what stage they have reached. In its last annual report, the German bank said it had received requests for information from U.S. authorities and she cooperated with them.

She has not responded to requests for immediate comment.

  The new offensive of American justice is carried by a new entity created in 2010 in the Department of Justice, Money Laundering and Bank Integrity Unit (division of banking integrity and money), which includes 12 prosecutors.

She led the investigation into the BNP and institutions such as HSBC, ING Bank and others.

  Faced with this charge, the banks responded by hiring thousands of experts in compliance and invested millions of dollars to improve their related programs.

  Insofar as the division accumulates large files, prosecutors fear that financial offenders fold now on medium-sized institutions, which do not have control procedures adopted to date by the major banks.

  That is why the investigation division more on intermediaries such as brokers (broker-dealers), the jewelry traders, the car dealerships, casinos, insurance companies and shipowners.