Standard Chartered will pay $1.1 billion to regulators in the United States and Britain after financial dealings that broke sanctions tied to Iran and other countries, among the heaviest penalties ever handed down for such conduct.
The accord, unveiled Tuesday, April 9, 2019, gives the London-based bank two additional years on a deferred prosecution agreement it first signed in 2012. Group Chief Executive Bill Winters said the conduct was “completely unacceptable” and “not representative” of the bank today.
Prosecutors described a pattern that stretched across years. The bank “undermined the integrity of our financial system and harmed our national security by deliberately providing Iranians with coveted access to the U.S. economy,” said Jessie Liu, the U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C. A former bank employee in Dubai admitted guilt in a state court in New York, while an Iranian customer faced federal charges.
Of the total, $928 million goes to American authorities, and Britain’s Financial Conduct Authority imposed a fine of 102 million pounds, or $133 million. New York’s Department of Financial Services said that between 2008 and 2014, $600 million in unlawful dollar transfers passed through the state from the bank’s offices in London and Dubai, with a further $20 million linked to parties in Syria, Sudan, Burma and Cuba.
The settlement was far from the bank’s first. It handed U.S. authorities a $667 million penalty in 2012 for moving millions of dollars through the American banking system for clients in Iran, Sudan, Libya and Myanmar, and paid another $300 million in 2014 after a monitor found shortcomings in its surveillance systems. In February the bank said it had reserved $900 million to cover a possible resolution.
By comparison, BNP Paribas paid $8.9 billion in 2014 for conspiring to evade sanctions, and France’s Credit Agricole paid $787 million in 2015. Linda Lacewell, New York’s acting financial services superintendent, said the state would ensure “the bank lives up to its word and maintains effective safeguards.”
Sources
- Standard Chartered to pay $1.1 billion for sanctions violations | Reuters
- U.S. Treasury Department Announces Settlement with Standard Chartered Bank | U.S. Department of the Treasury
