Episode 315 - Boeing Pays $51 Million for ITAR Violations
On Jan. 14, Patriot Bank, based in Stamford, Connecticut, entered into an agreement with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to address and rectify several alleged unsafe or unsound practices and violations of law....more
A new DOJ policy directs prosecutors to focus on crypto fraud and use of digital assets to facilitate other crimes. On April 7, 2025, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche issued a Memorandum titled, “Ending Regulation by...more
On April 7, 2025, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche issued a memo (the “Blanche Memo”) announcing the Trump administration’s Department of Justice (“DOJ”) refocus of enforcement policies related to investigations and...more
Last week, the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York unsealed an indictment against global cryptocurrency exchange KuCoin and two of its founders, Chun Gan and Ke Tang, for allegedly conspiring...more
Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency trading platform, has recently been hit with a staggering $4.3 billion fine for intentionally violating anti-money laundering laws and other financial regulations. This landmark...more
The Justice Department’s Antitrust Division has had a rough year in the criminal arena. While the Antitrust Division has aggressively blocked several proposed mergers, it has lost several significant criminal cases. ...more
NatWest pleaded guilty on Thursday 7 October 2021 to criminal charges brought by the UK financial services regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (the “FCA”). The FCA had charged NatWest with failing to properly monitor...more
Payoneer, Inc., an online money transmitter and prepaid access company, agreed to pay $1.4 million to OFAC to settle violations of multiple sanctions programs. ...more
In a harbinger of future enforcement actions surrounding AML compliance program violations, the Treasury Department’s The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network announced a $390 million settlement with Capital One for...more
The Justice Department continues to pursue criminal cases against Venezuelan officials at Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) in an attempt to strangle President Nicolas Maduro. DOJ has been pursuing a three-pronged strategy...more
On 12 March 2020, the UK Gambling Commission announced that it will fine online gambling business Betway Limited (“Betway”) £11.6 million for failures in respect of its anti-money laundering controls and handling of seven of...more
AML Scandals Seem to Inevitably Spawn Investor Lawsuits - As we recently blogged, Westpac, Australia’s second-largest retail bank, has been embroiled in a scandal arising from approximately 23 million alleged breaches of...more
Goldman Sachs is reportedly in negotiations with federal prosecutors to resolve claims about its role in the Malaysian 1MDB scandal for upwards of $2 billion. A settlement—which “could include a guilty plea from Goldman’s...more
I thought Frosty was a good analogy to consider the disgraced Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s former partner Tim Leissner, as he is certainly back again. Yesterday, I begin a two-part blog post series on Leissner’s settlement with...more
Settlement Applies to $700 Million in Luxury Assets; Law Firms Obtain a Carve-Out - Last week, the Justice Department announced a massive settlement in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (“1MDB”) case, a matter implicating...more
This week I am mining the guilty pleas of the former Unaoil Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Cyrus Ahsani, and former Chief Operations Officer (COO), Saman Ahsani, for what they might mean for Foreign Corrupt Practices Act...more
As reported by Byron Tau and Aruna Viswanatha in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), “Jho Low, the businessman-turned-fugitive accused of masterminding a multibillion-dollar fraud involving Malaysia’s sovereign-wealth fund, agreed...more
Danske Bank is likely to again become the target of a formal investigation in France. A Paris court began investigating Danske Bank in October 2017 in relation to transactions of its Estonian branch, between 2008 and 2011,...more
NYDFS Action Highlights the Need for Good Monitoring – and Good Consultants - In part one of this two-part post, we provided some practical tips for financial institutions to increase the chances that their Anti-Money...more
Commonwealth Bank of Australia (“CBA”), the largest bank in Australia, has agreed to a proposed civil settlement — subject to court approval — of historic proportions, involving a fine of approximately $700 million Australian...more
A recent anti-money laundering (“AML”) enforcement action reminds us of the increasing risk of individual liability for alleged violations of the Bank Secrecy Act (“BSA”), a key issue about which we have blogged....more
For those who might have wondered if the Sessions Justice Department (DOJ) was going to enforce the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), that question seems to have been answered in the affirmative. In September, the DOJ and...more
After the Panama Papers exposed efforts by wealthy individuals and government officials to hide funds offshore, government authorities around the world have responded with new legislation, regulations and enforcement actions...more