Eurozone member Latvia is scrambling to reform its banking sector after US authorities accused its third largest lender of large-scale money laundering with connections to North Korea’s nuclear weapons development programme.
Desperate to restore credibility, Riga is eliminating deposits in US dollars, cracking down on dealings with shell companies that may be used to facilitate money laundering and setting limits on the number of non-resident depositors that banks can serve.
Latvia’s “boutique banking” sector has long sold itself to foreigners as a gateway to the European Union, with 11 of Latvia’s 23 registered commercial banks catering to non-residents. A lucrative sector, exports …read more
Source: African news network 7
