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The OCC yesterday released enforcement actions recently taken against national banks and federal savings associations (banks), and individuals currently and formerly affiliated with banks the OCC supervises.

Formal Agreements with:

• 1st National Bank, Lebanon, Ohio, for unsafe or unsound practices, including those related to strategic planning, capital planning, liquidity risk management, and interest rate risk management
• Generations Bank, Seneca Falls, New York, for unsafe or unsound practices, including those related to board oversight, strategic planning, liquidity risk management, and interest rate risk management.
• Maple City Savings Bank, FSB, Hornell, New York, for unsafe or unsound practices, including those related to board oversight and corporate governance, strategic and capital planning, liquidity risk management, and interest rate risk management, and a violation relating to transactions with affiliates
• Slovenian S&LA of Franklin-Conemaugh, Conemaugh, Pennsylvania, for unsafe or unsound practices, including those related to strategic planning, succession planning, balance sheet management, internal audit, and the bank’s Bank Secrecy Act/Anti-Money Laundering (BSA/AML) internal controls, audit, and training, and violations of 12 CFR 21.21 (BSA/AML compliance program) and 31 CFR 1020.210 (Customer Due Diligence)

Orders of Prohibition against:

• James Gomes, former branch manager at a New York, New York, branch of TD Bank, N.A., Wilmington, Delaware, for accessing an elderly bank customer’s accounts without authorization and transferring over $200,000 from the customer’s accounts to his own accounts
• Priscilla Jones-Cotton, former branch manager at a Fort Myers, Florida, branch of PNC Bank, N.A., Wilmington, Delaware, for stealing, embezzling, or otherwise misappropriating approximately $32,000 from the bank
• Deidre Katschke, former universal vault specialist at BOKF, N.A., Tulsa, Oklahoma, for misappropriating approximately $42,500 in cash from the bank
• Maria Salazar, former teller at a Louisville, Kentucky, branch of PNC Bank, N.A., Wilmington, Delaware, for conducting unauthorized debit card transactions using bank customer accounts that totaled approximately $10,200

Notices of Charges for an Order of Prohibition against:

• Roberto A. Garcia, former personal banker at a North Miami, Florida, branch of JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., Columbus, Ohio. The Notice of Charges alleges, among other things, that Garcia stole over $12,000 in cash from the bank, engaged in account takeovers of bank customer accounts, and used customer accounts to pay personal expenses.
• Lexus Inez Lewis, former fraud operations specialist, at a Jacksonville, Florida, branch of Citibank, N.A., Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The Notice of Charges alleges, among other things, that Lewis made false representations in her employment application and became employed at the bank in violation of federal law; caused fraudulent transactions totaling at least $389,000 to occur on bank customers’ credit card accounts; and kept bank equipment without authorization

The FDIC has issued FIL-58-2024 with guidance to assist financial institutions and facilitate recovery in areas of South Dakota affected by severe storms, straight-line winds, and flooding from June 16 to July 8, 2024. As of August 21, the affected areas included Davison, Lincoln, Turner, and Union counties.

OFAC has announced efforts to modernize its infrastructure and approaches to engaging with stakeholders to ensure sanctions are easily understood and enforceable — a key recommendation highlighted in Treasury’s 2021 Sanctions Review that OFAC is working to implement.

To ensure that its guidance remains up to date and relevant for the public, OFAC is updating many of its FAQs on general sanctions questions and issues. These FAQs are often OFAC's most viewed guidance, as they deal with basic principles of sanctions implementation. The first installment of updated FAQs is available now (FAQs 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 91, 126, 468, and 469) and includes guidance on key topics such as what OFAC means by “blocked property” and how to verify the authenticity of an OFAC document.

OFAC will continue reviewing FAQs through an ongoing process focused on providing up-to-date and useful information to the public. OFAC will announce subsequent FAQ updates via its Recent Actions Notices.

The OCC, Federal Reserve, FDIC, NCUA, CFPB, FHFA, CFTC, SEC, and Treasury Department have published [89 FR 67890] in today's Federal Register, their previously announced notice of proposed rulemaking to establish data standards to promote interoperability of financial regulatory data across these agencies. Final standards established pursuant to this rulemaking will later be adopted for certain collections of information in separate rulemakings by the agencies or through other actions taken by the agencies. The agencies are proposing this rule as required by the Financial Data Transparency Act of 2022.

Comments on the proposal will be accepted for 60 days, through October 21, 2024.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has announced settled charges against New York-based registered transfer agent Equiniti Trust Company LLC, formerly known as American Stock Transfer & Trust Company LLC, for failing to assure that client securities and funds were protected against theft or misuse. Those failures led to the loss of more than $6.6 million of client funds as a result of two separate cyber intrusions in 2022 and 2023. American Stock Transfer was able to recover approximately $2.6 million of the losses and fully reimbursed the clients for their losses. To settle the SEC’s charges, Equiniti agreed to pay a civil penalty of $850,000.

• SEC Order

The FDIC has published [89 FR 67002] in this morning's Federal Register a proposal to amend its filing requirements and processing procedures for notices filed under the Change in Bank Control Act (CBCA) by removing the exemption from the notice requirement for acquisitions of voting securities of a depository institution holding company with an FDIC-supervised subsidiary institution for which the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (FRB) reviews a notice under the CBCA and by making conforming definitional changes. The FDIC also seeks information and comment regarding its approach to change in control notices under the CBCA with regard to persons who may be directly or indirectly exercising control over an FDIC-supervised institution.

Comments are due by October 18, 2024.

FDIC FIL-57-2024 was issued Friday with information to provide regulatory relief to FDIC-supervised financial institutions and facilitate recovery in areas of Florida affected by Hurricane Debby. The affected areas are Columbia, Dixie, Gilchrist, Hamilton, Lafayette, Levy, Manatee, Sarasota, Suwannee, and Taylor Counties.

The FDIC has issued FIL-56-2024 to alert financial institutions it has updated its Questions and Answers page for the final rule governing FDIC Official Signs and Advertising Requirements, False Advertising, Misrepresentation of Insured Status, and Misuse of the FDIC Name or Logo (part 328). The Q&As provide clarifying information on the final rule to support stakeholders in the implementation of part 328.

The Q&As cover key implementation topics that include, for example, the placement and display of the official digital sign and non-deposit sign, use of the advertising statement on various deposit-taking channels on websites, mobile apps, ATMs, and social media, as well as information on technical assistance support, such as where to obtain downloadable versions of the official digital sign.

Yesterday, the OCC announced the release of its annual update to the Bank Accounting Advisory Service (BAAS).

The BAAS contains staff responses to frequently asked questions from the banking industry and bank examiners on a variety of accounting topics and promotes consistent application of accounting standards and regulatory reporting among national banks and federal savings associations.

This edition of the BAAS revises certain content for general clarity and also removes superseded content. The updates do not alter the OCC Office of the Chief Accountant’s prior conclusions or interpretations.

The BAAS does not represent rules or regulations of the OCC. Rather, it represents the OCC Office of the Chief Accountant’s interpretations of generally accepted accounting principles and regulatory guidance based on the facts and circumstances presented.

The Treasury Department has reported that OFAC has sanctioned several companies, individuals, and vessels for their involvement in the shipment of Iranian commodities, including oil and liquefied petroleum gas, to Yemen and the United Arab Emirates on behalf of the network of Iran-based, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force-backed Houthi financial official Sa’id al-Jamal. OFAC also updated the Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List entry for the sanctioned vessel ARTURA (IMO: 9150365), which was responsible for shipping commodities for Sa’id al-Jamal, to reflect the changing of its name to OHAR.

For the names and identification information of the designated parties, see this August 15, 2024, BankersOnline OFAC Update.