US Treasury Warns Banks Against Enforcing Sanctions Too Hard

A huge number of prescriptions, instructions and sanctions have led to the fact that US banks refuse to service preventively, without risk analysis. US Treasuryintends to carry out explanatory work with banksUnited States Department of the TreasuryUnited States Department of the TreasuryUnited States Department of the TreasuryUnited States Department of the TreasuryUnited States Department of the Treasury

The US Treasury intends to warn the country's banks against being too strict in complying with sanctions requirements, which leads to frequent and unreasonable denials of service to customers, BLOOMBERG reports.

According to the agency, senior US Treasury officials are planning meetings with bank leaders in 2023 to "eliminate this dangerous trend." In their opinion, banks are being overly cautious and turning away customers who may need them most.

Thus, Deputy Secretary of the Treasury for Combating Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson plans to travel to Seattle, San Francisco and San Diego in January to meet with bankers.

“When financial institutions engage in risk reduction — the indiscriminate loss of financial access for entire categories of customers — ordinary Americans may be forced to turn to unregulated and potentially dangerous financial activities,” Nelson quoted the agency as saying.

How the Russian economy adapted to the sanctions and what awaits it in the new year Economics

Bloomberg notes that successive US administrations have been quick and sometimes without much clarity to impose various sanctions , with the expectation that financial institutions will comply with them on their own. At the same time, banks that violate sanctions face heavy fines, so they often exercise extreme caution in relation to anything that can be considered an object of sanctions risk.

The goal of the Treasury is to ensure that no one is deprived of financial services just because some institution proactively disconnects suspicious individuals from services instead of assessing real risks.

Read on RBC Pro How a Saudi Arabian investment fund is trying to buy its own future What difficulties investors face when buying diamonds in RUSSIA 30 questions to help take stock and set goals for 2023 Risk group:Which employees are the easiest to change jobs?

As part of his outreach, Nelson plans to meet with big tech companies like APPLE and Alphabet, as well as smaller organizations like independent public banks and diaspora money service businesses that are being hit hardest by the tightening of sanctions.

Ex-Prime Minister of Belgium said about the "effect less than zero" sanctions against Russia Politics

“We believe that expanding financial inclusion and countering illicit finance are truly complementary rather than contradictory, which is why we continue to push for a risk-based approach to curbing money laundering, terrorist financing and other illicit activities,” Nelson said.

The United States last imposed sanctions against Russian companies on December 22, 2022. Then, ten companies were included in the SDN (Specially Designated Nationals List), which means blocking all owned assets and prohibiting Americans from interacting with them: the Morinformsystem-Agat concern, the Prometheus Central Research Institute of Structural Materials, the Rigel battery company, the Central Research Institute ship engineering (Sudmash), scientific and production association "Aurora", concern "Central Research Institute" Elektropribor ", the enterprise" Obukhovskoye "," Marine Navigation Systems ", Institute of Oceanology. P.P. Shirshov RAS, Technopol company.