Yahoo Finance Six Commonwealth Bank ATM deals may be linked to terrorism funding, Austrac says
Commonwealth Bank’s intelligent deposit ATMs may have been used on six separate occasions to finance terrorism, Australia’s financial intelligence agency has alleged.
Peter Clark, acting chief executive of the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (Austrac), says five customers were allegedly involved in the suspect transactions, and the federal court is aware of the matter.
He has also said Westpac, ANZ and National Australia Bank are not suspected of breaching the anti-money laundering laws CBA has allegedly broken.
Two weeks ago, Austrac launched civil proceedings in the federal court against CBA, claiming the bank had made “serious and systemic” violations of laws aimed at combating the funding of terrorism and crime syndicates.
The case relates to the use of intelligent deposit machines, a type of ATM launched in 2012, which allows customers to anonymously deposit and transfer cash, even when banks are closed.
Commonwealth Bank is accused of failing to report properly to Austrac on $77m worth of suspicious transactions.
“Six of those relate to cash transactions by five customers with respect to whom the bank has assessed have a potential link to terrorism or terrorism financing,” Clark said on Friday.
“We’ve looked at the other [major] banks in particular and we have not identified the same issues with those banks,” he said.
Austrac has already alleged that CBA’s ATMs were used by four money-laundering syndicates, including three linked to drug importation and distribution networks.
The syndicates used the machines to deposit and transfer cash, often at amounts just low enough to avoid arousing suspicion.
One money-laundering operation involved more than $21m being deposited into 11 CBA accounts between February 2015 and May 2016, most of which came through the intelligent machines, Austrac says.
The money was allegedly the illicit proceeds of a drug importation operation, and was quickly transferred to domestic accounts.
Commonwealth Bank knew the accounts to be suspicious as early as May 2015, but failed to take proper steps to alert authorities to several large transactions.
By mid-2015, the bank was allegedly aware of unusual patterns of transactions in some of the accounts, but still did not alert authorities, and allowed the payments to continue.
It allegedly failed to act even after a warning from the Australian federal police (AFP).
“The AFP advised Commbank in late 2015 that a number of these accounts were connected with an investigation into serious criminal offences, including ‘drug important and unlawful processing of money’,” Austrac alleged in its statement of claim.
Clark declined on Friday to say that Austrac was considering an enforceable undertaking against the bank.
“I can’t comment on that, senator,” he said. “That’s obviously a matter that will come out in terms of the proceedings.”
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission is also investigating whether CBA broke disclosure laws by not telling investors about possible money laundering by criminal gangs and suspected terrorists.
CBA chairman Catherine Livingstone announced this week that embattled chief executive Ian Narev would step aside by 1 July 2018.
