On Tuesday, the Treasury Department announced a real eye-opener of a fine, levied against the Bank of America, to the tune of a total of $1.2 billion. The fine is for Bank of America's alleged violation of anti-money-laundering and sanctions laws.
The U.S. Treasury Department said Tuesday that it’s imposing $1.2 billion in fines on Bank of America for allegedly violating anti-money laundering and sanctions laws.
The fines on America’s second-biggest bank amount to the third-largest in the department’s history.
“When a bank of this size fails to meet its anti-money laundering and sanctions obligations, the consequences extend far beyond its own walls, exposing the entire U.S. financial system to significant illicit finance risks,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement. “Today’s actions send a clear message that even the biggest financial institutions are not above the law.”
Treasury said Bank of America also reached an $11.6 million settlement with the department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control over “apparent violations of numerous sanctions programs, including on Iran, Russia, narcotics, and global terrorism.”
This is not only a big whopping fine, but it's also the third-biggest fine the Treasury Department has ever levied on any financial institution. In the statement from the Treasury Department, it states that the Bank of America admitted to violations of the 1970 Bank Secrecy Act, an anti-money laundering law. Bank of America has released its own statement:
“Financial crime compliance is serious, and we are responsible for getting it right,’’ Bank of America said in a statement. “We worked with regulators to reach these penalty resolutions stemming from violations cited in the previously reported 2024 (Comptroller of the Currency) Consent Order and FinCEN’s investigation.
“We have invested billions of dollars in technology and dedicated thousands of employees to combat financial crime, and our team is far along with and committed to completing the work required to address the issues raised by our regulators.’’
While no specifics are given, think for a moment on the possibilities of slacking off on these laws. Through inattention, the Bank of America could have allowed funds to flow to cartels, to terror groups, to rogue nations and to corrupt officials. And this, it seems, isn't the first time the Bank of America has been called to account in this matter.
$750 million of that fine was levied by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) today announced a $750 million civil money penalty against Bank of America, N.A. (bank), for violations of the Bank Secrecy Act and its implementing regulations, including 12 CFR 21.21 and 12 CFR 21.11. This amount is the largest in OCC history. The bank is also subject to a December 2024 cease-and-desist order (2024 Order), which requires the bank to address its deficient Bank Secrecy Act/anti-money laundering (BSA/AML) compliance program.
One wonders if America's second-largest bank will now be dropping down that scale a few notches.
The Treasury Department has been sending some pretty clear messages lately, and now here's another one: There will be no slacking off on enforcement of anti-money-laundering and sanctions laws, and if an institution does, by design or by inattention, ignore these laws, there will be consequences. In this case, there are 1.2 billion of them.