Snake on side of road On Nut

[55Jay]

HSBC agrees to pay record $1.9bn fine

Posted on » Wednesday, December 12, 2012

NEW YORK: HSBC Holdings agreed to pay a record $1.92 billion in fines to US authorities for allowing itself to be used to launder a river of drug money flowing out of Mexico and other banking lapses.

Mexico's Sinaloa cartel and Colombia's Norte del Valle cartel between them laundered $881 million through HSBC and a Mexican unit, the US Justice Department said yesterday.

In a deferred prosecution agreement with the Justice Department, the bank acknowledged it failed to maintain an effective programme against money laundering and failed to conduct basic due diligence on some of its account holders.

Under the agreement, the bank agreed to take steps to fix the problems, forfeit $1.256bn, and retain a compliance monitor. The bank also agreed to pay $665m in civil penalties to regulators including to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Federal Reserve, and the Treasury Department.

"We accept responsibility for our past mistakes. We have said we are profoundly sorry for them, and we do so again. The HSBC of today is a fundamentally different organisation from the one that made those mistakes," HSBC chief executive Stuart Gulliver said.

HSBC's money-laundering lapses in Mexico and elsewhere were cited in an extensive Senate report earlier this year, but the documents filed in court yesterday provided new details. Despite the known risks of doing business in Mexico, the bank put the country in its lowest risk category, which excluded $670bn in transactions from the monitoring systems, according to the documents. Bank officials repeatedly ignored internal warnings that HSBC's monitoring systems were inadequate, the Justice Department said.

[ajarnpot]

What nonsense, the rest of the world is making money from Iran,

[worgeordie]

The USA is on a nice little earner fining British Companies ,

BP (well they did deserve it) now HSBC,

regards Worgeordie

PS just wondering where does all this fine money go?

[NanLaew]

These banks reaching a settlement with the US government and paying multi-million dollar fines include several that took huge government cash bailouts. I am not sure where the fines are going but they are pretty much all coming out of taxpayers pockets.

Sent from the soi at the edge of the universe with an Asus eePad Transformer TF201 thingumabob.

[paulchiangmai]

Obama has got it in for British companies, not only HSBC but also BP and Standard Chartered. It's time for Americas best friend to look for real friends and not one's that stab you in the back at every opportunity. All these costs the US imposes fall back on the poor old British taxpayer at the end of the day. Perhaps Britain can do the same antics with Starbucks, Google and Amazon.

[SantiSuk]

Obama has got it in for British companies, not only HSBC but also BP and Standard Chartered. It's time for Americas best friend to look for real friends and not one's that stab you in the back at every opportunity. All these costs the US imposes fall back on the poor old British taxpayer at the end of the day. Perhaps Britain can do the same antics with Starbucks, Google and Amazon.

I disagree. BP and HSBC were both far too cavalier in different ways and got what they deserved as a result of managements' lack of control in fundamentally core aspects of their respective businesses.

The loss falls on shareholders of those 2 companies, who have suffered and will suffer reduced dividend payouts, not on British taxpayers.

[Normally proud Brit]

[paulchiangmai]

Obama has got it in for British companies, not only HSBC but also BP and Standard Chartered. It's time for Americas best friend to look for real friends and not one's that stab you in the back at every opportunity. All these costs the US imposes fall back on the poor old British taxpayer at the end of the day. Perhaps Britain can do the same antics with Starbucks, Google and Amazon.

I disagree. BP and HSBC were both far too cavalier in different ways and got what they deserved as a result of managements' lack of control in fundamentally core aspects of their respective businesses.

The loss falls on shareholders of those 2 companies, who have suffered and will suffer reduced dividend payouts, not on British taxpayers.

[Normally proud Brit]

Those shareholders would have paid tax on their earnings hence it must be made up by others, also I am sure that these massive fines and costs will be tax deductable, another loss to the tax income. Always proud Brit.

[givenall]

What nonsense, the rest of the world is making money from Iran,

Well we give all the businesses to China, why not this one

[cardholder]

These banks reaching a settlement with the US government and paying multi-million dollar fines include several that took huge government cash bailouts. I am not sure where the fines are going but they are pretty much all coming out of taxpayers pockets.

Sent from the soi at the edge of the universe with an Asus eePad Transformer TF201 thingumabob.

Except for HSBC who have not taken any government cash bailouts - inter alia, the shareholders will take the burden.