Deutsche Bank Fined $200 Mln for 'Inadequate' Anti-Money Laundering

Deutsche Bank is fined by the UK Financial Conduct Authority for "inadequate" anti-money laundering control framework.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The United Kingdom's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) fined Deutsche Bank more than $200 million for "inadequate" anti-money laundering control framework in 2012-15, FCA said in a statement Tuesday.

"The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has today fined Deutsche Bank AG (Deutsche Bank) 163,076,224 [pounds] for failing to maintain an adequate anti-money laundering (AML) control framework during the period between 1 January 2012 and 31 December 2015," it said.

FCA said the fine was "the largest financial penalty for AML controls failings ever imposed" by the regulator and its predecessor, the Financial Services Authority.

"As a consequence of its inadequate AML control framework, Deutsche Bank was used by unidentified customers to transfer approximately $10 billion, of unknown origin, from Russia to offshore bank accounts in a manner that is highly suggestive of financial crime," the statement continued.

It claimed that the bank's subsidiary DB Moscow was allowed to "execute more than 2,400 pairs of trades that mirrored each other" in April 2012 and October 2014. The so-called mirror trades were said to be used by Deutsche Bank and DB Moscow clients to transfer over $6 billion from Russia to accounts including in Cyprus, Estonia and Latvia.

FCA Director of Enforcement and Market Oversight Mark Steward called Deutsche Bank's alleged infractions "simply unacceptable."

"Other firms should take notice of today’s fine and look again at their own AML procedures to ensure they do not face similar action," Steward said.