Foreign financial institutions and other non-U.S. companies newly tasked with disclosing when their affiliates deal with Iranian government officials are finding the requirements onerous, according to compliance officers and consultants.
After a busy year for federal sanctions officials, large banks with international footprints are increasingly instituting deeper, standalone audits of their related policies and procedures, say compliance officers and consultants.
A congressional panel Thursday approved a measure requiring the White House to publicly report on the financial networks used by Iran and Hezbollah in South America to evade U.S. financial sanctions.
Proposals to bar Iranian financial institutions from a global interbank messaging service would impose additional costs on Iran's banks without entirely blocking them from accessing Western financial institutions.
An executive order signed Sunday to implement new banking sanctions against Iran doesnt clarify the extent to which U.S. financial institutions must peel back transactions to discover potential links to Iran.
The U.S. Treasury Department Monday sanctioned Iran's third largest bank hours after the European Union agreed to freeze the assets of the Middle Eastern nation's central bank.
The authors of a U.S. embargo against Iran's central bank and petroleum industry called on the White House Thursday to be strict with foreign financial institutions under the law's statutes.
U.S. and foreign banks are awaiting official guidance on how to adhere to a new American sanctions law against the Central Bank of Iran before implementing its screening procedures.
U.S. senators Monday approved a reconciled defense appropriations bill that would sanction Iran's central bank, making only a single nod to White House concerns that the bill would displease trade partners.
The U.K.'s latest economic sanctions against Iran will likely cost banks proceeds from dropped trade finance deals in addition to new compliance expenses, according to attorneys and officials at British financial institutions.
The Obama Administration Thursday voiced opposition to a Senate plan to bar any foreign bank that knowingly conducts transactions with the Central Bank of Iran from the U.S. financial system.
U.S. and European banks are rejecting millions of dollars of legitimate remittances originating from Iran and intended for Iranians and Iranian-Americans in the United States, even when federal authorities approve the transactions.
Caught between pressure from U.S. lawmakers to crack down harder on Iran and Syria and the desire to act in concert with America's allies, the White House is walking a fine line in its use of economic sanctions.
The United States will sanction Turkish and Venezuelan banks as early as next week for knowingly processing transactions tied to designated Iranian entities, according to individuals familiar with the matter.
Domestic banks and foreign financial institutions with U.S. branches are scrambling to comply with a tough new U.S. law and subsequent regulations designed to cripple the Iranian financial system, say analysts.
Lawmakers passed a tough new sanctions measure against Iran Thursday that would require U.S. banks to determine whether the foreign financial institutions they have correspondent relationships with bank certain Iranians.