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HSBC to pay $1.9 billion to settle money laundering probe

Banking giant HSBC paid the huge sum to settle allegations of money laundering that were said to have helped terrorists and Iran.

Image: Lewis Whyld/PA Wire

BANKING GIANT HSBC says it has agreed to pay US authorities a record $1.92 billion – around €1.4 billion –   to settle allegations of money laundering that were said to have helped terrorists and Iran.

“HSBC has reached agreement with United States authorities in relation to investigations regarding inadequate compliance with anti-money laundering and sanctions laws,” the Hong Kong-listed lender said in a statement.

The London-based but Asia-focused bank also vowed to continue to cooperate fully with authorities to strengthen its compliance policies after the so-called “deferred prosecution agreement” with the US Department of Justice.

“We accept responsibility for our past mistakes. We have said we are profoundly sorry for them, and we do so again,” group chief executive Stuart Gulliver said in the statement.

“The HSBC of today is a fundamentally different organisation from the one that made those mistakes.

“We are committed to protecting the integrity of the global financial system. To this end we will continue to work closely with governments and regulators around the world,” Gulliver added.

US lawmakers accused the global bank in July of giving Iran, terrorists and drug dealers access to the US financial system. The firm soon afterwards apologised for failing to apply anti-laundering rules, and a senior executive resigned.

David Bagley, the head of group compliance for London-based HSBC, was forced to step down from his post in the wake of a US Senate subcommittee’s damning report on the bank’s operations.

In early November HSBC said it had set aside $1.5 billion for fines linked to money-laundering in the United States.

- © AFP, 2012

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Comments (13 Comments)

  • So they illegally laundered money to fund a war in which thousands of people die…and nobody’s going to jail because they bribed their way out of it?

    I don’t want to live on this planet anymore.

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  • And we notice that nobody is even being charged over this. Have money, have power, have immunity

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  • Anything to make money, and to think how they rammed Anti Money Laundering training down staff’s throats!!

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  • And that’s how you buy of all your responsibility…

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  • The corporate global elite bankers again prove they are immune to the law they create. This is the NWO and global governance. And we get call conspiracy theorists and quacks when we have said this for years. Corporate banks have laundered drug money for decades yet no one is held responsible.

    the Romney family, namely Mitt, Ann, G Scott and Tagg Romney, along with Mitt’s “6th son” and campaign finance chair have a secretive private equity firm called Solamere Capital Partners. This firms ties to Romney’s campaign and bundlers is already well documented, along with its connection to the manufacture and distribution of voting machines. What is not as well documented is a subsidiary of that private equity firm hiring employees of a failed firm tied to a Ponzi scheme that has a long history of money laundering for Latin American drug cartels and to the Iran-Contra scandal.’

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  • The banks are the enemy of the people. The evidence is continuous and irrefutable. The NTMA has alleged recently that the agency has been subject of a €3.2m fraud by financial services company State Street. The response of our finance minister was very revealing in its casual acceptance of another financial scandal.
    Mr Noonan said that it was his job to see that the state was not at a loss, and that everything that was misappropriated has been reclaimed.
    He said there was no evidence of a more widespread problem, describing the State Street case as “wholly exceptional and very surprising”.
    Newsflash Noonan. There are almost weekly revelations of ‘overcharging’ in the banking system. It is most definitely not wholly exceptional. The notion of an actual criminal charge being brought against the perpetrators though would be exceptional and very surprising.
    It is clear that our leaders will not protect us against the financial parasites. On the contrary, they have beggared the country to pay for the gambling losses of our own and European banks.
    The people need to protect themselves and reclaim our authority over the banks.
    This can be achieved through a National Mortgage Strike

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  • And surprise, surprise, HSBC are one of the bondholders in Irish ‘debt’. Hey, I’ve a fantastic idea: let’s steal money from Irish taxpayers, and hand it over to a murderous, money-laundering bank. Oh, wait, our drooling quislings have already covered that angle.

    http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_HLD-3KNiebg/TLr-M1e2p-I/AAAAAAAAAAg/9gcaIADoGBw/s1600/ai-bondholders.gif

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  • HSBC raised my house payment because I couldn’t afford what I was paying them and then took my house from me and its still standing empty over a year later. All this while they fund terrorists- Bastards

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  • Ailísh 11/12/12 #

    “failing to apply anti-laundering rules” again. Anybody not getting some fine money off them might call them criminals.

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  • The UK Financial Supine Authority will probably invite them to Claridges for lunch and fine them in the region of £1.84. Can’t think of his name at the moment but the guy in charge at HSBC when this was happening now works for Cameron in Downing Street.

    Reply

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