Page 11 - HSBC (D) Case Study
P. 11
“Gulliver stressed that the bank had co-
operated with the US authorities. "Over the last
two years, under new senior leadership, we
have been taking concrete steps to put right
what went wrong and to participate actively
with government authorities in bringing to light
and addressing these matters,"(1)
The Senate said the bank had for years operated a
"pervasively polluted" culture, allowing HSBC to move
billions around the financial system for Mexican drug
lords, such as laundered $881m for the Mexican Sinaloa
drug cartel and Colombia’s Norte del Valle cartel, and
doing the same for terrorists and governments on
sanctions lists.
In terms of the US
it was estimated
that HSBC's
Mexican
operations
(HBMX) between
2007-8 moved
$7bn into its US
operations, which
the Senate was
told was tied to drug money. (1, 2)
“HSBC US (HBUS) nevertheless classed Mexico as a low-
risk country and as a result, failed to properly monitor its
transfers and other dealings with it.” (2)
