Today, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) announced that it has assessed a $1.2 billion penalty against Bank of America, N.A. (Bank of America) for its failure to mitigate and report priority national security risks, including Chinese money laundering networks and illicit finance along the southwest border. Concurrently, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency assessed a $750 million civil money penalty for the bank’s deficient and ineffective Bank Secrecy Act/anti-money laundering (BSA/AML) compliance program. In addition, the Office of Foreign Assets Control announced an $11.6 million settlement agreement with the bank over apparent violations of numerous sanctions programs, including on Iran, Russia, narcotics, and global terrorism.
As part of its resolution with FinCEN, Bank of America admits that it willfully violated the BSA and failed to implement and maintain an AML program that met the minimum requirements of the BSA and FinCEN’s implementing regulations, conduct due diligence for correspondent accounts for foreign financial institutions, and file Suspicious Activity Reports.
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