August 30 (SeeNews) - U.S. private equity firm J.C. Flowers & Co and its Romanian subsidiary First Bank SA have agreed to remit $862,318 (737,854 euro) to settle allegations regarding the violation of U.S. sanctions on Iran and Syria, the U.S. Treasury Department said.
Specifically, First Bank processed 98 commercial transactions totaling $3,589,189 through U.S. banks on behalf of parties located in Iran and Syria, the U.S Treasury Department said in a press release on Friday.
In 2018, after JC Flowers acquired a majority ownership interest in First Bank, First Bank processed Euro-denominated payments for persons located in Iran. The settlement amount reflects Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) determination that the apparent violations were voluntarily self-disclosed and non-egregious, the Treasury Department said.
OFAC is a financial intelligence and enforcement agency of the U.S Treasury Department.
In early 2019, First Bank’s regulator, the national bank of Romania, flagged a U.S. dollar transaction that the bank had processed for a shipment of timber from Romania to Syria. As a result, First Bank commenced a five-year lookback in March 2019.
The apparent violations resulted from First Bank’s lack of understanding of the scope of U.S. sanctions regulations applicable to financial institutions without a physical presence in the United States, the Treasury Department noted.
J.C Flowers acquired Piraeus Bank Romania in 2018 and then renamed it to First Bank S.A. In 2019, First Bank took over Romanian lender Leumi Romania SA, which ceased to exist as a separate legal entity.
($=0.8507 euro)
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