TD Bank to Pay $20 Million US

Shweta Mazoomdar
5 Min Read

The TD Bank is a Canadian multinational banking and financial services corporation. This bank is headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. The bank was created on February 1, 1955, through the merger of the Bank of Toronto and the Dominion Bank. These banks were founded in 1855 and 1869, respectively. It is one of two Big Five banks of Canada founded in Toronto, the other being the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce.

In 2021, according to Standard & Poor’s, the TD Bank Group was the largest bank in Canada. This is by total assets and also by market capitalization, a top 10 bank in North America. Plus, it is the 23rd largest bank in the world. In 2019, it was designated a global systemically important bank. This was by the Financial Stability Board.

In 2023, the company was ranked 43rd in the Forbes Global 2000. The bank and its subsidiaries have over 89,000 employees. It also has over 26 million clients worldwide. In Canada, the bank operates through its TD Canada Trust division and serves more than 11 million customers at over 1,091 branches.

What is Happening Recently in the TD Bank?

The Toronto-Dominion or the TD Bank is set to pay more than $20 million US. This was stated as part of a deal with American authorities to resolve an investigation into a former employee’s fraud trading tactics. This was done to manipulate the U.S. Treasuries market.

Canada’s second-largest bank entered into a three-year deferred prosecution agreement. This was stated as per the U.S. Department of Justice said on Monday in a filing with the New Jersey federal court.

The agreement will end the criminal and civil probe. This was according to the filing which involved “placing hundreds of fraudulent spoof orders. All of this is amounting to tens of billions of dollars of false supply. Along with it, the various forms of demand in the secondary market for U.S. Treasuries” by former trader Jeyakumar Nadarajah regarding the TD Bank were added too.

How Much Will The TD Bank Pay?

This especially comes at a time when the Canadian lender is close to a possible guilty plea to criminal charges. This is related to the U.S. retail bank which failed to curb money laundering tied to Chinese crime groups. Plus, the illicit fentanyl sales about which the Wall Street Journal reported last week.

The bank will pay a $12.5 million US criminal penalty to resolve civil investigations by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. This comes on top of an approximately $9.5 million US criminal penalty related to the agreement. The bank has also agreed to pay $4.7 million US in victim compensation and $1.4 million US in forfeiture.

More On TD Bank…

TD Bank Group, which is mired up in a money-laundering scandal in the United States. This was said Raymond Chun who will replace chief executive Bharat Masrani, who is retiring next year.

Chun, who stepped into the role of head of Canadian personal banking last December, will become the new chief operating officer. This will happen on Nov. 1 before taking over the top job when Masrani officially steps down on April 10.

The leadership shakeup was announced on Thursday. It in it also includes several other executive changes. It comes in effectively as the bank works to resolve investigations into deficiencies in its anti-money-laundering program in the U.S.. This is when it was allegedly allowed hundreds of millions of dollars of illicit drug profits to flow through the bank.

Masrani, during the announcing of his retirement after 38 years at the bank and a decade in charge, said the shortcomings in the program were under his responsibility to bear.

“This took place on my watch as CEO, and I take full responsibility,” he said on a conference call.

“I will continue to advance and direct the critical remediation program required to meet our obligations and responsibilities and strengthen our risk and control foundation.”

The investigations have been a major overhang for the bank and helped scuttle its proposed $13.4-billion US acquisition of U.S. bank First Horizon in May last year.

Chun said on the call that remediation is the top priority as the bank looks to write its next chapter.

“TD Bank is a critical part of our financial system and economy.… We also have a significant challenge in front of us.”

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