Reuters, Sept. 20 - BuzzFeed and other media outlets on Sunday quoted confidential documents submitted by bankers to the US government as saying that over a period of almost 20 years, several multinational banks transferred large amounts of allegedly illegal funds despite warnings about the origin of these funds.
These media reports are based on leaked “SAR” reports. SAR refers to suspicious activity reports submitted by banks and financial institutions and the US Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).
The number of SARs reported was over 2,100. BuzzFeed News obtained the report and shared it with the International Union of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and other media organizations.
According to ICIJ, overall, the file contains information on transactions alerted as suspicious by the financial institution's internal compliance department between 1999 and 2017, with a total transaction value of more than 2 trillion US dollars. The SAR itself doesn't need to prove misconduct. ICIJ said these leaked documents are just a small part of the banking industry's report to FinCEN.
According to ICIJ, the five most frequently mentioned multinational banks in the document are: HSBC Holdings, J.P. Morgan, Deutsche Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, and Bank of New York Mellon. (complete)
****If you want to refer to the original report, please click to read it****
(Compiled by Lee Ting-yee, revised by Dai Suping)
(tina.li1@thomsonreuters.com; 886-2-87295108;)
These media reports are based on leaked “SAR” reports. SAR refers to suspicious activity reports submitted by banks and financial institutions and the US Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).
The number of SARs reported was over 2,100. BuzzFeed News obtained the report and shared it with the International Union of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and other media organizations.
According to ICIJ, overall, the file contains information on transactions alerted as suspicious by the financial institution's internal compliance department between 1999 and 2017, with a total transaction value of more than 2 trillion US dollars. The SAR itself doesn't need to prove misconduct. ICIJ said these leaked documents are just a small part of the banking industry's report to FinCEN.
According to ICIJ, the five most frequently mentioned multinational banks in the document are: HSBC Holdings, J.P. Morgan, Deutsche Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, and Bank of New York Mellon. (complete)
****If you want to refer to the original report, please click to read it****
(Compiled by Lee Ting-yee, revised by Dai Suping)
(tina.li1@thomsonreuters.com; 886-2-87295108;)