Deutsche Bank (NYSE: DB) is facing another scandal involving the flow of suspicious funds or dirty money amounting to nearly $2 trillion around the world between 1999 and 2017.
A leaked document from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) showed that Deutsche Bank facilitated $1.3 trillion transactions deemed suspicious. It appears that the German investment bank and financial services firm is on top of the list of financial institutions that facilitated dirty money worldwide over almost two decades.
According to DW, in 2019, BuzzFeed obtained a large cache of FinCEN files containing secret reports detailing suspicious financial transactions. The media outlet shared those leaked documents with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). More than 400 journalists from 88 countries reviewed the documents.
The Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) requires banks and other financial institutions to report suspicious transactions such as money laundering, tax evasions, or sanctions violations. Financial institutions such as Deutsche Bank submit Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) to the FinCEN, which is responsible for investigating the transaction flagged as suspicious. SARs are not necessarily evidence of financial crimes.
Deutsche Bank says it made significant investments to help fight financial crimes
In response to the media reports regarding the issue, Deutsche Bank said the leaked SARs “have already been investigated and led to regulatory resolutions in which the bank’s cooperation and remediation [were] publicly recognized.”
