Bank of America has been hit with a $1.2 billion penalty after federal regulators found the banking giant failed to report billions of dollars in suspicious transactions. The settlement is among the largest financial enforcement actions in U.S. The penalty, announced Tuesday by the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), is the third-largest in the agency's history.
It is surpassed only by penalties against cryptocurrency exchange Binance in 2023 and TD Bank in 2024. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the failures posed risks extending well beyond the bank itself. "Financial institutions are on the front lines of protecting our economic and national security," Bessent said in a statement announcing the enforcement action.
"When a bank of this size fails to meet its anti-money laundering and sanctions obligations, the consequences extend far beyond its own walls, exposing the entire U.S. financial system to significant illicit finance risks." The findings have also brought renewed attention to some of the biggest financial penalties imposed on banks, several of which have run into the tens of billions of dollars. FinCEN said Bank of America failed to report more than $5 billion in suspicious transactions, including activity potentially linked to Chinese money-laundering networks and illicit finance along the U.S.-Mexico border. The regulator found that the country's second-largest bank had willfully violated the Bank Secrecy Act.
This is the federal law requiring financial institutions to maintain safeguards against money laundering and report suspicious transactions. The Treasury Department also announced an $11.6 million settlement with the Office of Foreign Assets Control over apparent sanctions violations involving countries including Iran and Russia. Separately, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency imposed a $750 million penalty, the largest in its history.
However, that amount will be credited against the $1.2 billion FinCEN penalty rather than added to it. This means the two penalties should not be counted as a combined $1.95 billion fine. The $1.2 billion action stands out among anti-money-laundering enforcement cases.
However, it is considerably smaller than some of the largest banking settlements reached with U.S. authorities. Unlike FinCEN's penalties, the following five major settlements cover broader financial misconduct, including mortgage-related fraud and sanctions violations. Their announced totals can include consumer relief as well as monetary penalties, making them a different measure from a single regulatory fine.
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