On 20 September, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) published their investigative report which covered suspicious cases of global money laundering. Within the report, three Georgian Banks, namely the TBC Bank, Bank of Georgia and ProCredit Bank have been named as involved parties in global money laundering cases, reported agenda.ge.

The reports stated that over 200,000 suspicious financial transactions valued at over $2 trillion occurred from 1999 to 2017 across multiple global financial institutions. The documents appear to show that while both the banks and the United States government had this financial intelligence, they did little to stop activities such as money laundering. The information implicates financial institutions in more than 170 countries that played a role in the facilitation of money laundering and other crimes. The documents show how Russian oligarchs have used banks to avoid sanctions that were supposed to stop them getting their money into the West. 

As for the Georgian banks implicated in the report, TBC Bank has made 167 allegedly suspicious transactions, which have made for receipts of $1 billion and the sending of nearly $17.9 million. The Bank of Georgia received more than $8 million and sent $81,000. ProCredit Bank sent a total of $414,418 worth of transactions flagged as suspicious. The allegedly suspicious transactions were made with the Zurich branch of Habib Bank, Uralsib Bank, Russia’s Sberbank, the National Bank of Ras in UAE and the Romanian Raiffeisenbank. 

In response to the FinCEN Files investigation, the Banking Association of Georgia said that all banks in Georgia provide transaction information to the Financial Monitoring Service and that monitoring and reporting are carried out in full compliance with the laws and regulations. 

To note, the owners of Georgia’s TBC Bank Mamuka Khazaradze and Badri Japaridze are still under investigation by the Georgian state over a money laundering case involving the companies  LTD Samgori M and LTD Samgori Trade. However, an independent expert hired by Transparency International in Georgia stated that there is no basis to prove that Khazaradze, Japaridze and the Georgian businessman Avtandil Tsereteli was involved in money laundering (Caucasus Watch reported).