Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft (DB) Accused of Misleading Shareholders
In March 2018 after years of scandal, Deutsche Bank touted its remediation efforts regarding its anti-money laundering (“AML”) and other control functions in its annual report for 2017, stating that the Bank ” identified the need to strengthen internal control environment and infrastructure and have embarked on initiatives to accomplish this.” Throughout the relevant period, the Bank represented that it was continuing to conduct these initiatives and reaffirmed its efforts at remediating AML and other control functions. Despite the positive representations of the Bank’s efforts, on May 13, 2020, media outlets reported that the Federal Reserve’s internal audit had revealed the Bank had failed to address concerns that had been identified years earlier, including its AML and other control procedure failures. Finally, on July 7, 2020, the New York State Department of Financial Services fined the Bank $150 million for neglecting to flag numerous questionable transactions from accounts associated with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and two correspondent banks, Danske Estonia and FBME Bank, both of which were subjects of prior scandals involving financial misconduct.
