Barclays recently settled in US federal court to remit payment of $298m (£190m) for “willfully and knowingly” violating internationally-recognised sanctions by facilitating money transfers numbering in the hundreds of millions with such locales as Iran, Sudan, Cuba, Burma, and Libya in a clandestine manner.
TheUK business bank account agreed to the fines this week in a criminal case settlement with the US Justice department which had leveled accusations at Barclays of violating regulations that forbade the conducting of business with certain sovereign states that are classified as possible national security threats.
In a federally-filed batch of court documents in Washington, DC, Barclays faced accusations of facilitating cash transfers through their New York corporate branch from proscribed sources in excess of $500 million from 1995 to over a decade later in 2006. Not the only international offender, Barclays joins the ranks of other large European banking institutions such as Credit Suisse and Lloyds TSB, both banks having settled similar lawsuits with the US federal government in 2009.
In an plea agreement entered into on behalf of Barclays by general counsel Mark Harding, the banking institution will pay $149 million each to the US federal Justice department and to the New York District Attorney’s office, in addition to agreeing to undergoing improvements in its training processes, tightening of any internal procedures that might have led to the initial violations, and also agreeing to co-operating with any subsequent US state and federal investigations.
In an effort to downplay the embarrassment of such a high-profile error, Barclays has been co-operating in a proactive manner with the US federal authorities. Damage control is an integral part of the bank’s strategy for developing a positively-received US presence since its majority purchase of failed Wall Street investment bank Lehman Brothers for $1.75 billion.