BSI Bank sanctioned by Monetary Authority of Singapore

08 June 2016

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) sanctioned BSI Bank Limited (BSI Bank) and gave notice of intention to withdraw its status as a merchant bank in Singapore for serious breaches of anti-money laundering requirements, poor management oversight of the bank’s operations, and gross misconduct by the bank’s staff. MAS also referred to the Public Prosecutor the names of six members of BSI Bank’s senior management and staff to examine whether any criminal offences had been committed.

Financial crime compliance and failure: how to resolve an impossible situation

07 June 2016
Knowledge Base

Banks worldwide have been struggling in the battle against financial crime. Recent high-profile examples demonstrate that the rate of anti-money laundering (AML) compliance enforcement is continuing to rise. At the same time, the cost of compliance failure is escalating with fines and provisions increasing by at least 300% during the second half of 2012 compared to the first. If the related impact to banks’ bottom line is not damaging enough, the loss of trust among customers and regulators makes the combined effect potentially life-threatening.
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FCA fines CT Capital Ltd for failures related to PPI complaint handling

07 June 2016

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) recently fined CT Capital Ltd (CT Capital) £2,360,900 for serious failings in its historic Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) complaint handling processes. Between May 2011 and November 2013, during which time it handled 6,669 PPI complaints, CT Capital failed to put in place complaint handling processes to deal with PPI complaints appropriately, which resulted in customers missing out on redress payments to which they were entitled. The effect on individual customers was potentially significant: the average redress payment made in respect of a fully upheld complaint during the period was £5,959.
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Evil corruption in sport

02 June 2016
Knowledge Base

by Evert-Jan Lammers

If you are not a sponsor, an athlete or a gambler you probably wouldn’t know that the largest running event in Europe took place last weekend in Brussels. But you would know of the coming-up European football championship and the Olympic games. What you should know is that in most sports, big and small, international and local, there is match fixing, doping of athletes, and vote-buying (in bidding). The world of sports is infected. If only we could smell it.
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FCA proposes cap on early exit changes

26 May 2016

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has today announced the level at which it will consult to cap early exit charges for those consumers wishing to make use of the pension freedoms. The FCA has proposed that for existing contract-based personal pensions, including workplace personal pensions, exit charges will be capped at 1% of the value of a member’s pot. Firms will not be able to apply any exit charge for personal pension contracts entered into after the proposed new rules come into force.

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Nordea’s merger plans

19 May 2016

Nordea welcomes the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority’s (SFSA) approval of the merger plans between Nordea and its subsidiary banks Nordea Bank Danmark, Nordea Bank Finland and Nordea Bank Norge, respectively. This is an important step in our work to simplify our legal structure, with the aim to change the Norwegian, Danish and Finnish banks to branches of the Swedish parent company.  Continue reading…