The International Congress of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), a Washington-based NGO, published on Sunday evening, September 20, a report to denounce the role of banks in the laundering and circulation of dirty money, via transfers of funds from illicit activities (drug trafficking, weapons or works of art, corruption, tax evasion, etc.). The report is based on a tiny fraction of the suspicious activity reports (SAR) that banks transmitted between 1999 and 2017 to the US Treasury's financial police (FinCEN), and that were able to obtain BuzzFeed  News. But this sample still represents $2 trillion in suspicious transactions. In France, these declarations are intended for Tracfin.

Nothing very new unfortunately, but enough to remind bank shareholders of the risks of fines or even withdrawal of license. Also taking into account the rumors of total reconfinement that circulated on Monday, the banks listed in Paris strongly stalled that day, whether Société Générale (- 7.7%), Natixis (- 7.5%), BNP Paribas (- 6.4%), Crédit Agricole (- 5.4%) or  HSBC (-5.4%). The ICIJ report cited HSBC, Deutsche Bank and US institutions (JPMorgan Chase, Standard Chartered, Bank of New York Mellon). For example , HSBC had to pay a $1.9 billion fine for helping South American drug cartels launder $900 million.

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For investors, the necessary anti-money laundering controls mean that banks deprive themselves of revenue and suffer an increase in the heavy regulatory costs they already bear. For example, the workforce of the Compliance department of Société Générale has increased 2.5 times in recent years to 2,500 people. It is a question of meeting the obligation to know the customers well, even when they go through various legal shells. An article in Le Monde, dated Wednesday, recalled old cases, including two concerning clients at risk of Société Générale. One involved the Rotenberg family, close to Vladimir Putin, and the other Russian real estate tycoon Aras Agalarov, who allegedly had a role in Moscow's interference in the 2016 US presidential campaign.

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Document INVTIR0020200928eg9q00006