A financial regulator from New York has informed 13 foreign banks doing business in the state to hand over details about their dealings with Panama's infamous law firm, which helped establish thousands of shell companies.
According to Bloomberg, the Department of Financial Services in New York asked institutions, including the Societe Generale, Commerzbank, Deutsche Bank, Amro Group, and Credit Suisse to provide communications, records, and logs of other transactions between their New York branches and agents or employees of Mossack Fonseca. However, it is to be noted that these banks aren't accused of any illegal doings.
The US law enforcement and the country's regulators are trying to respond to an unprecedented report which alleges wealthy people and international companies of shielding their wealth using companies established by the Panama firm, Mossack Fonseca. The allegations exploded this month following the report published by the International the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and other news organizations, which claimed that they have obtained 11.5 million documents which outline more than 200,000 shell companies.
The Center for Public Integrity reported that the banks have been given 10 days to respond from the requests. Currently, the regulator is probing for possible violations of rules or regulations linked to Mossack Fonseca. Spokesmen from Societe Generale, ABN Amro, and Deutsche Bank declined to comment while other banks could not be immediately reached.
US prosecutors are searching into whether the leaked files might provide evidence of any illegal activity for new cases and existing ones. Also, prosecutors in the Department of Justice's tax, money-laundering and fraud units are evaluating news reports based on the files. The Justice department is also determining whether the result of the findings points to evidence of corruption or any violations of the country's law, reports Reuters.
The order from the US regulators is similar in form to a subpoena request from a federal prosecutor.
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