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US Senator Elizabeth Warren Calls For Citi To Be Broken Up
Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has written to a US financial regulator asking it to consider breaking up Citi, the fourth largest bank in the US, following a series of “massive blunders”.
Warren wrote to Michael Hsu, acting comptroller of the currency, and laid out her case for breaking up the bank by quoting Hsu’s own speeches.
Last year, Hsu outlined a four-step framework to address the failings of large banks that have become “too-big-to-manage”.
The steps included: 1) private warnings; 2) public enforcement and fines; 3) growth restrictions; and 4) breaking up recidivist banks.
Despite hundreds of millions of dollars in civil penalties and enforcement orders since 2020, Citi has been “unable or unwilling” to address its compliance failures, said Warren.
“The evidence is clear: Citi has failed to make sufficient progress, despite being provided four years to do so. Following your own escalation framework, it may be time to break up Citi,” the senator wrote.
Swedish Banking Group Lobbies For Tougher Financial Crime Measures
The Swedish Bankers' Association (SBA) has proposed a series of measures to crack down on the misuse of business intermediaries in organised economic crime.
In a petition to the Swedish government, the trade association called for stricter regulation, highlighting how intermediaries can be vulnerable to exploitation by criminal networks to commit white-collar crimes including fraud, tax evasion and money laundering.
"The measures are expected to result in severely limited opportunities for criminals to use companies as criminal tools," said Erik Wendeby, senior lawyer at the SBA.
The SBA's proposal includes mandatory authorisation for intermediaries, centralised registration and stricter reporting obligations for those dealing with financial crime.
These changes aim to curb what the association describes as widespread abuse of so-called "historical companies" used in fraudulent schemes, which has caused significant financial damage to both the state and private individuals.
EPC Releases Updated Guidance On Mobile-Initiated SEPA Instant Payments
The European Payments Council (EPC) has released the third version of its Mobile-Initiated SEPA (Instant) Credit Transfer and Technical Interoperability Guidance.
This latest iteration follows a public consultation in Q3 2024 and is intended to improve the technical interoperability of SEPA Instant Credit Transfers.
The new guidance expands on transaction flows for different modes of mobile payments, including payee-presented and payer-presented options, as well as those involving payment initiation service providers (PISPs).
By outlining the interactions between payer and payee service providers, it highlights critical aspects of ensuring successful payments and dealing with potential failures.
The guidance also aligns with the EU's incoming Instant Payments Regulation (IPR) and defines minimum data sets for seamless cross-platform payments.
Swift To Facilitate Live Cross-Border Digital Asset Transactions From 2025
From 2025 onwards, banks and central banks in Europe, Asia and North America will begin using the Swift network to conduct live trials of digital asset and digital currency transactions.
The trials will explore how Swift can provide its financial institutions with a single window of access to multiple digital asset classes and currencies.
Initial use cases will focus on payments, FX, securities and trade, enabling multi-ledger delivery-versus-payment (DvP) and payment-versus-payment (PvP) transactions.
Swift said that in previous studies it has already demonstrated that it can transfer tokenised value across public and private blockchains, interlinking central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) and other digital asset classes.
“Swift’s trials will leverage its unique position at the heart of the financial system to interlink these disparate networks with each other as well as with existing fiat currencies,” it said.
“This will enable Swift’s global community to seamlessly transact using digital assets and currencies alongside traditional forms of value, using their existing infrastructure.”
