Singapore and Hong Kong, two of Asia’s busiest financial hubs, have decided it’s time to take their long-standing cooperation up a notch. On September 17, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) signed a new Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) designed to strengthen cross-border banking supervision.
Exactech, a Gainesville, Florida–based medical device company, is paying the price for cutting corners on patient safety. The company has agreed to an $8 million settlement with the U.S. government after being accused of selling faulty knee replacement devices to Medicare, Medicaid, and the Department of Veterans Affairs — a deal signed off by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware as the company works through its Chapter 11 case.
For Varengold Bank AG, the reckoning has finally arrived. After years of audits, inspections, and missed opportunities to get its house in order, Germany’s financial regulator BaFin has handed the Hamburg-based bank a bill it can’t ignore, with €3.8 million ($4.1 million) in fines and an order to fix its broken anti-money laundering defenses.
When a firm holds customer money, regulators expect those funds to be walled off, safe, and untouchable. For thirteen years, Jefferies’ calculations said they were. In reality, they weren’t, and FINRA has now fined the firm $1 million for failing one of the industry’s most basic safeguards.
The legal fight over the SEC’s climate disclosure rule remains in limbo after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit issued an order on September 12 continuing its hold on petitions for review. The court made clear that it is now up to the Securities and Exchange Commission to determine the fate of the rules, either through notice-and-comment rulemaking or by renewing its defense in ongoing litigation (Iowa v. SEC).
The Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) has imposed an administrative monetary penalty on the Saskatchewan Indian Gaming Authority (SIGA), citing multiple violations of Canada’s anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing laws.
Chegg, the education technology company known for its online study tools, has agreed to pay $7.5 million after the Federal Trade Commission accused it of making it needlessly difficult for students and parents to cancel recurring subscriptions.