Money laundering

In a speech at the American Bankers Association Washington Summit Wednesday morning, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent downplayed economic risks from tariffs, floated capital reforms and urged regulatory relief for community banks.

The Toronto-based bank suspended its medium-term growth targets and announced a full-scale review of its strategies following historic anti-money-laundering failures.

In its semiannual supervision and regulation report, the Federal Reserve flagged climbing loan delinquencies and a rising number of large bank citations for governance and controls.

The penalty by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is a major setback for the San Francisco bank, which was freed from a separate anti-money-laundering order in 2021. Its stock price fell sharply after the news broke.

New rules from Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network will mandate reporting for non-financed real estate transfers and expand anti-money-laundering requirements for investment advisors.

Executives at the Toronto-based bank said last year that they planned to add 150 branches in the United States. But when pressed on Thursday, they could not say how much they'll scale back their ambitions due to investigations over TD's anti-money laundering practices.

The number of suspicious activity reports involving cryptocurrency topped 90,000 in 2021, according to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. The reason for the uptick may be that crypto is becoming more mainstream.

Because there are currently no obligations on the sector to file suspicious activity reports — and no penalties associated with not reporting — there is no real incentive to report, writes the vice president of SmartSearch.

If the GOP can hold its majority in the chamber, Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., will likely become the panel's chairman. His ardent support for free-market principles could set up partisan clashes with Democrats over pandemic relief, money laundering rules and more.

The future of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Fed’s supervisory regime for the biggest financial institutions, reform of the Community Reinvestment Act and a host of other industry-related issues are on the ballot this November.