{"id":17726,"date":"2025-07-04T13:57:58","date_gmt":"2025-07-04T13:57:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/?p=17726"},"modified":"2025-07-04T13:57:58","modified_gmt":"2025-07-04T13:57:58","slug":"ubs-and-citi-among-nine-banks-fined-21-5mn-in-singapore-money-laundering-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/?p=17726","title":{"rendered":"UBS and Citi among nine banks fined $21.5mn in Singapore money-laundering case"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Singapore has hit banks and wealth managers including UBS, Citi and Julius Baer with its second-largest collective penalty ever in relation to a money-laundering case that dented the city-state\u2019s clean reputation and cast a pall over its wealth management sector.<\/p>\n

Nine financial institutions received a collective penalty of S$27.45mn (US$21.5mn), the largest figure since penalties in the 1MDB case, over what Singapore\u2019s regulator called \u201cpoor and inconsistent implementation\u201d of controls in a US$2bn money-laundering scandal.<\/p>\n

The case, which was linked to online gambling in Asia, led to the convictions of 10 Chinese nationals and island-wide seizures of assets including gold bars and luxury cars.<\/p>\n

It cast a shadow over Singapore\u2019s ambitions to be a leading wealth management hub and underscored the challenge of opening up to foreign wealth while enforcing strict anti-money laundering rules.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike other major international financial centres, Singapore is exposed to money-laundering risks,\u201d said Ho Hern Shin, deputy managing director for financial supervision at the Monetary Authority of Singapore.<\/p>\n

\u201cMAS will work closely with financial institutions to promote more consistent implementation of [anti-money laundering] measures. Where there are serious failings by FIs and their employees, MAS will not hesitate to take firm action.\u201d<\/p>\n

In its report, the regulator said it found \u201cdeficiencies\u201d in how financial institutions carried out money-laundering risk assessments for new clients, how they corroborated clients\u2019 source of wealth and how they handled transactions flagged as \u201csuspicious\u201d by their own systems.<\/p>\n

Credit Suisse, which has since been acquired by UBS, received the biggest single penalty, at S$5.8mn. UBS was hit with S$3mn and Citi with S$2.6mn.<\/p>\n

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The regulator also named executives and relationship managers at United Overseas Bank and smaller institutions for issues including a failure to establish their customers\u2019 source of wealth.<\/p>\n

United Overseas Bank said it \u201cacknowledge[d] and accept[ed] MAS\u2019 findings with regard to the identified areas for improvement\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the past two years, we have implemented prompt remedial actions to address the deficiencies identified after a comprehensive internal review, including stepping up on our transaction monitoring and customer due diligence processes,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

Blue Ocean Invest, an asset manager, said it \u201cacknowledges the findings\u201d and had \u201cimplemented measures to enhance internal policies and procedures\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe co-operated fully with the MAS throughout the inspection, and a detailed remediation plan to address the breaches has been implemented,\u201d said a spokesperson for Trident Trust.<\/p>\n

LGT, Julius Baer and UBS said they also acknowledged the regulator\u2019s findings and had co-operated fully with authorities during their investigation.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for Citi Singapore said the bank \u201cstrengthened our client onboarding and monitoring processes and continue to work closely with the authorities to protect the integrity of the financial system and enhance financial crime risk and controls measures\u201d.<\/p>\n

Data visualisation by Haohsiang Ko<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free Singapore has hit banks and wealth managers including UBS, Citi and Julius Baer with its second-largest collective penalty ever in relation to a money-laundering case that dented the city-state\u2019s clean reputation and cast a pall over its wealth management sector. Nine financial institutions received a collective penalty of S$27.45mn<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17727,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[206],"tags":[7179,2387,406,592,2809,1040,606,3246,2475],"class_list":{"0":"post-17726","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-financial-crime","8":"tag-21-5mn","9":"tag-among","10":"tag-banks","11":"tag-case","12":"tag-citi","13":"tag-fined","14":"tag-moneylaundering","15":"tag-singapore","16":"tag-ubs"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finderica.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}