I am not trusted to work for a bank

- 7 June, 2021

I have just read a short piece by my friend BC Tan, in which he commented upon the annual Thomson Reuters publication, The Cost of Compliance. BC referenced the survey of the top 3 skill sets required for an ideal compliance officer in 2021, being:

1. Subject matter expertise
2. Communication skills
3. Ability to anticipate future regulatory trends

This caused me to ponder, is integrity a skillset or a characteristic? Is subject matter expertise, an acquired skill set? I believe I have the requisite skills, but I am not the ideal compliance officer in 2021, indeed, I have not been for many years. The reason being is I cannot be trusted. It’s not that I am dishonest, on the contrary I have a profile and a reputation for being very honest. I do not have a criminal record and I have a robust credit history. I hold diplomas in anti-money laundering (AML) and financial crime, as well as fraud investigation qualifications. I have previously held the roles of money laundering reporting officer (MLRO) and head of financial crime, so I think I am qualified and experienced, but I am not ideal.

2008, Is whistleblowing a characteristic or a skill set?

The reason I am not trusted is because in 2008, I blew the whistle against my former employer, Wachovia Bank NA, now part of Wells Fargo Bank NA and as such I went against the bank. I stood alone and said, laundering money for Mexican drug cartels and Eastern European organised crime groups was/is wrong. It was as though, I was the problem, not the money laundering customers. All was well until Martin Woods opened his mouth and told tales.

To some I am a traitor, to many, my actions mark me out as a man who cannot be trusted. The irony of it, I am too honest to work for a bank. Over the years I have applied for hundreds of AML and financial crime roles at various banks. In some instances, I secured interviews, in one instance, I secured a contract, which was later withdrawn and in another, a contract was in the process of being drafted, but it never arrived.

Back then in 2010/11

Circa 2010/2011, I was interviewed for an interim role as MLRO covering maternity leave for the corporate and commercial banking division of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), now NatWest Bank. I distinctly recollect one of the senior bankers who interviewed me saying he would want me to do exactly what I had previously done at Wachovia Bank and that was why he wanted to hire me. I was uplifted by the words and commitment. Later, the employment agent advised the contract was being drafted. This is the contract that never arrived.

Then in 2012

For a number of years, I had grown increasingly perplexed and frustrated, it was not until I was recruited as the MLRO for Thomson Reuters (Reuters) foreign exchange trading business, that I learned what had happened. Upon employing me, Reuters submitted a form ‘A’ to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and requested their approval to appoint me as the MLRO. To my surprise, this request was declined. I was in limbo, I had a role, but I would be unable to fulfil it if the FCA withheld their approval.

The situation was not immediately resolved, in fact it took 91 days to overcome the issues presented by the FCA. It transpired, I had been labelled as a ‘non-routine’, which effectively blocked me receiving approval from the FCA. Most firms and banks are immediately put off when they see this and consequently do not proceed with the application and the candidate.

Interestingly the same year in 2012, the FCA took three days to approve an FX manager as MLRO for a business Reuters had acquired. The man couldn’t spell AML, let alone tell you what it meant. So, there I was, qualified for the role and credit to Reuters, they had hired me because I was a whistleblower, nothing was hidden and they trusted me. Importantly, they backed me in my confrontation with the FCA.

I engaged lawyers and discovered the FCA alleged I had breached a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) I had signed with Wells Fargo. I hadn’t, Wells Fargo, the other party to a confidential agreement, determined I hadn’t and after allowing the FCA to see the agreement, they reluctantly agreed and my appointment as MLRO was approved.

The journey of discovery in 2013

I remained angry and intrigued as to what had taken place, why and how. In January 2013 I served legal notice upon the FCA (Data Protection Act, subject access request) and received copies of hundreds of documents, including emails and reports which discussed me or related to me. I discovered, it was in fact the FCA, not the banks who did not trust me, perhaps more accurately, did not like me.

The blunt fact is the FCA do not like whistleblowers, because when you blow the whistle upon a regulated firm or bank, you are likely to be simultaneously blowing the whistle upon regulatory failure. Moreover, the parties you are blowing the whistle upon, actually pay the salaries of the regulators, in the form of fees. Be warned, big banks pay a lot of fees.

Upon reading the documents I obtained from the FCA I established senior managers within the FCA were concerned that I would say something negative about a function of the FCA, namely the whistleblowing department, given the way they had treated me.

Back again to 2010

In early 2010, a third party sent the senior managers an email, attached to which was a promotional document for a financial crime conference I was scheduled to present at in Miami, later that year. The document specifically stated I would not breach my NDA, instead I would talk generically about what actions a person could take if they discovered or suspected criminal conduct within their firm/bank.

The FCA ignored the reference to me not breaching the NDA, which they mistakenly believed prevented me from saying anything at all about the money laundering at Wachovia Bank. On the contrary, the NDA only prohibited me telling lies about the bank. Well, I am a whistleblower, my sword and my shield is the truth. Moreover why would I decide to tell lies about the bank when the truth presented an incredibly compelling narrative of a bank which some say, almost made money laundering a core business. One commentator actually described the bank as the world’s first full service, narco bank.

Back then in 2010, the FCA asked Well Fargo if they would be taking action against me for breaching a confidential NDA, that the FCA had never seen. Wells Fargo stated they would not be taking any action. This was logical, because there had been no breach and this would remain the case in Miami later that year.

Within the email dialogue between the senior managers, they accused me of talking to the media, which, at that time, I had not done so. Given I was in fact the one person at that time encouraging people to blow the whistle to regulators, what was the harm in talking to the media?

Frustrated and fearful of me saying negative things about the FCA, the senior managers hatched a plan. They fabricated allegations against me, alleging I had breached a NDA and in doing so I had placed a question mark against my integrity, which challenged whether I was fit and proper to work in the regulated sector, should I decide to return to work in the future. In order to hide their actions and identities, they invented a non-existent whistleblower and attributed these allegations to this non-existent person. Then, they had a colleague create a fake whistleblowing report and attach the same to my personal file, thereby labelling me non-routine.

It was a spiteful act of revenge by a group of men who disliked my criticism of them and the FCA. I had been blacklisted and they had put in place a label which they hoped would hurt me and stop me ever again being approved by the FCA to undertake the role of MLRO and stop money laundering.

One of the roles this action impacted was the temporary maternity cover with RBS/NatWest Bank.

Complaining to the FCA about the conduct of the FCA – no need to guess the outcome

I complained to the FCA and alleged a lack of integrity by a number of senior managers, as well as malicious conduct. The FCA’s complaints department did not agree with my allegations of misconduct by FCA staff, instead they said there had been ‘some relatively minor failings’, which ‘demonstrated a lack of care’.

Minor failings extended to:-

Fabricating allegations against a whistleblower with the expressed intent of stopping him from doing it again
Inventing a non-existent whistleblower to hide behind
Causing the creation of a fake whistleblowing report, to challenge the integrity of a real whistleblower and stop him ever again becoming approved to perform the role of MLRO

All of which shows a ‘lack of care’. Which is not true, they cared very much, they cared enough to behave in such a deceitful way.

Furthermore, in justifying these actions and the ‘relatively minor failings’, the FCA’s response continued the deceit and suggested intelligence had been received which alleged I had breached the NDA. This was not true, there was no intelligence, beyond a simple ‘FYI’ referring to the promotional document for the event in Miami. The cover up was taking place.

Pursuant to which the FCA complaints and financial crime department stated –

‘Logging information which poses a risk of adverse publicity in relation to any of the FSA/FCA’s functions seems both sensible and appropriate’.

Be warned, saying something negative, albeit true about the FCA can get you blacklisted.

But here was the motivation clearly articulated by the FCA, and it was because of this perception the senior managers embarked upon a spiteful course of vengeance.

Notwithstanding all of the above, the FCA found no evidence that allegations had been fabricated and a fictitious whistleblowing report being created. Thus, this makes me a liar and I should expect the FCA to take appropriate action, after all I am now alleging the investigation is part of a cover up and if I am making it up, I am defaming the FCA, indeed I am challenging the integrity of the FCA.

Fast forward to 2021

The FCA have now applied a criminal money laundering charge against NatWest Bank, the bank I so nearly worked for as their MLRO in 2010/11. I believe the deceitful actions of the FCA stopped me taking that role. I have a reputation for stopping money laundering, I have done so everywhere I have worked. Who knows, maybe I could have stopped the money laundering the FCA now allege the bank engaged in.

The FCA embarked upon a course of action to ensure I would not repeat my conduct at Wachovia Bank, but a senior banker at RBS/NatWest Bank actually wanted me to so, should I find it necessary to do so.

Thus, who is guilty of what here? I believe the FCA actually stopped me taking my AML skill set to NatWest Bank and now they are prosecuting the bank for AML failures. You couldn’t make it up, well, you could if you worked for the FCA, after all, they did.