The Bank of Mozambique has fined 15 commercial banks and other financial institutions a total of 316.49 million meticais (about 5.2 million US dollars) for various violations of financial legislation.
The central bank statement, published on Monday, makes good a promise by the governor of the Bank of Mozambique, Rogerio Zandamela, that banks breaking the law will be named and shamed. It is the first time the central bank has published such a list.
Most of the large fines are for violations of the law against money laundering and the financing of terrorism. The central bank does not go into detail, but it is reasonable to assume that the commercial banks have failed in their reporting duties under this law.
The fines cover offences committed mostly in the 2015 and 2016 financial years. The largest fine, 32 million meticais, was imposed against one of the newer banks, Banco Unico, in which the largest shareholder is the South African Nedbank Group.
The two largest commercial banks, the Millennium-BIM, and the Commercial and Investment Bank (BCI), which both have Portuguese financial institutions as their majority shareholders, were fined 24 million meticais each for violating the money-laundering and anti-terrorism law. So was Barclays Bank.
Indeed, of the largest commercial banks operating in Mozambique, only Standard Bank was not fined.
Source: AIM
