Jersey's Royal Court fines Abu Dhabi Commercial bank

On 5 February 2020, the Royal Court sentenced Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank PJSC, Jersey Branch (ADCBJ) to a fine of £475,000, and awarded costs of £25,000, for failing to comply with the requirements of Money Laundering (Jersey) Order 2008.

This is the first time since 2005 that a corporate offender has been convicted and sentenced for failures to comply with the Money Laundering Order under the Proceeds of Crime (Jersey) Law 1999.

ADCBJ pleaded guilty to failing to have appropriate or consistent policies and procedures in respect of transaction monitoring and risk management in the case of two of its Middle Eastern customers. The bank allowed these customers to operate their accounts for a number of years in ways which were not in line with expected behavior.

During the five-year period both customers had been withdrawing large sums of cash from their accounts, in some instances in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, over the counter in the UAE without ADCBJ knowing what the customers were using the cash for. The amount of doubtful transactions from 2013 to 2018 was approximately $ 1.2 million.

The actions of customers entailed a clear risk of money laundering or terrorist financing without ADCBJ being aware that it was going on. The court does not claim that any of these clients was clearly involved in criminal activities. However, ADCBJ acknowledged that they did not have adequate systems to counter the risk of money laundering or terrorist financing.

Source: https://www.gov.je/News/2020/Pages/BankFined.aspx