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Bill Catlin

U.S. Bank fined $613M for charges relating to money laundering protections

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The U.S. Department of Justice has filed felony criminal charges against Minneapolis-based U.S. Bank for willfully lacking an adequate anti-money-laundering program and failing to file suspicious activity reports.

U.S. Bank will pay a total of $613 million in penalties to various oversight agencies.

The Justice Department has agreed to delay prosecution for two years and then seek dismissal of the criminal charges if U.S. Bank abides by an agreement to improve its compliance.

The company's share price was down 0.2 percent in morning trading following the announcement.

A scathing news release from the Manhattan U.S. Attorney says U.S. Bank operated its anti-money laundering program "on the cheap."

The prosecutor's office cites internal communications indicating the bank's staff was "stretched dangerously thin." The banks Anti-Money Laundering Officer says the program is an effort to "use 'smoke and mirrors' to 'pull the wool over the eyes,'" of one regulatory agency.

The news release says bank employees failed to act on multiple warning signs about a customer described by one bank official as "quite the slippery character."

The customer, Scott Tucker, was convicted in 2013 of running an illegal payday lending operation.

In a statement, U.S. Bank CEO Andy Cecere said "we regret and have accepted responsibility for the past deficiencies in our AML program. Our culture of ethics and integrity demands that we do better. One of U.S. Bank's key priorities is to maintain an exceptional AML program and we are confident in the strength of the program we have in place today."