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Enforcement Release: March 30, 2023
OFAC Settles with Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. for $30,000,000 Related to Apparent Violations of Three Sanctions Programs
Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. (“Wells Fargo”) has agreed to remit $30,000,000 to settle its potential civil liability for 124 apparent violations of three sanctions programs. For about seven years beginning in 2008 and ending in 2015, Wells Fargo, and its predecessor, Wachovia Bank (“Wachovia”), provided a foreign bank located in Europe with software that the foreign bank then used to process trade finance transactions with U.S.-sanctioned jurisdictions and persons. Wachovia, at the direction of a mid-level manager, customized a trade insourcing software platform for general use by the European bank that Wachovia knew or should have known would include engaging in trade-finance transactions with sanctioned jurisdictions and persons. The European bank then used the platform to manage such transactions.
Wells Fargo did not...
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1) RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE ENFORCEMENT RELEASE AND SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT
In a first for OFAC, OFAC has released a settlement agreement of which the “Factual Statement” is reproduced word-for-word in the main Enforcement Release. The Wells Fargo ("WF") Settlement Agreement does not contain any notable information about the violation that the Enforcement Release web post does not contain, except that the Settlement Agreement confirms that “[n]one of the payments associated with these [sanctions-implicating] transactions were processed by Wells Fargo or any other U.S. bank.” The relevance of this is discussed further below. Note that the “Terms of Settlement” here are substantially similar to those found in the last settlement agreement published by OFAC (Settlement Agreement (OFAC) - Alfa Laval Middle East Ltd. (April, 2021))....