Watchdog extends monitor mandate at Deutsche Bank on Danske dealings
FRANKFURT (Reuters) - German financial watchdog Bafin has extended the mandate of its monitor at Deutsche Bank over the bank's role in a money laundering scandal involving Danske Bank, Germany's flagship lender said in a statement on Friday.
"There is a strong interest in the matters concerning Danske Bank Estonia among regulators globally. There are still no indications of misconduct on our part in this context," Deutsche Bank said.
German weekly Der Spiegel earlier reported that Bafin had notified the bank on the mandate extension some days ago.
Deutsche Bank acted as a correspondent bank for Danske Bank in Estonia, meaning it helped transfer funds on behalf of the Danish lender from Estonia to places like New York.
Deutsche Bank has received requests for information from regulators and law enforcement agencies, including the U.S. Federal Reserve, that are investigating the Danske situation.
Danske Bank is under investigation over suspicious payments totaling 200 billion euros ($225 billion) from 2007 until 2015 from its Estonia branch.
Deutsche Bank has scaled back its correspondent banking business by around 40 percent since 2016. In Russia it cut such activity by around 75 percent since 2016, while it has exited such business in Moldova, Estonia and Latvia.
Board member Karl von Rohr said last week the lender had, so far, not made any provisions for possible legal costs relating to the Danske case.
In 2017, the Fed was among regulators that fined Deutsche Bank nearly $700 million for weak controls that allowed money laundering from Russia. A U.S. Department of Justice investigation into the case is still ongoing.
(Writing by Arno Schuetze; Editing by Riham Alkousaa)
