IF the glib way lawyer Vincent Salido of the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) treated Senators’ queries this week about developments in the now-notorious RCBC cash-laundering scandal is any indication, a company and gratifying end that effects in a more relaxed and ethically reliable banking enterprise might be an unrealistic expectation.
At the beginning of February, a sophisticated cybertheft operation won manipulate of the Bangladesh Bank’s inner structures and interface with the supposedly secure SWIFT worldwide financial institution communication community, and transferred $one hundred million from the bank’s account on the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Of that amount, $19 million turned into despatched to Sri Lanka, however changed into intercepted by means of alert central financial institution officials after one of the intermediate banks the cash surpassed via noticed a spelling error at the transaction order.
The other $81 million was despatched to several US greenback debts opened through the Jupiter St. Department of RCBC in Makati, wherein over a 4-day length, all but approximately $sixty four,000 changed into dispensed in each greenbacks and pesos to more than one shady characters, no matter frantic messages from the imperative financial institution in Bangladesh to forestall all transactions and maintain on to the price range.