WILL ARAB BANK CASE SUCCEED WHERE US REGULATORS HAVE FAILED ?

                                                   

In the motion picture "Groundhog Day, " Bill Murray's character was forced to painfully relive the same day, over and over again. That same story is often repeated, when it comes to AML deficiencies of American banks; regulators cite them, and then cite them again, at a future time, but the banks named continue to fail when it comes to maintaining an effective AML program.

The jury verdict, handed down yesterday against Arab Bank, may succeed in scaring bank directors into creating, and maintaining, effective compliance regimes, lest they find themselves potentially at the wrong end of a multi-million dollar judgment, which will shortly be the fate of the Arab Bank, and the resultant negative publicity surrounding such a case.

It is interesting that a group of American trial lawyers, as an unexpected result of the Arab Bank case, may have done what US regulatory agencies have been trying to do for years: cause the banks to seriously implement AML/CFT programs that work.