NEWS: Germany to get new FinCrime Authority, finance minister reveals; follows Wirecard and BaFin scandals – and just days ahead of critical FATF report

Regulatory Watch News

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  SEC Charges Audit Firm BF Borgers and Its Owner with Massive Fraud Affecting More Than 1,500 SEC Filings

  SEC

  May 3, 2024

  Washington D.C., May 3, 2024 —

  The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged audit firm BF Borgers CPA PC and its owner, Benjamin F. Borgers (together, “Respondents”), with deliberate and systemic failures to comply with Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) standards in its audits and reviews incorporated in more than 1,500 SEC filings from January 2021 through June 2023. The SEC also charged the Respondents with falsely representing to their clients that the firm’s work would comply with PCAOB standards; fabricating audit documentation to make it appear that the firm’s work did comply with PCAOB standards; and falsely stating in audit reports included in more than 500 public company SEC filings that the firm’s audits complied with PCAOB standards.

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  Financial sanctions update: Global Human Rights

  OFSI

  May 3, 2024

  On 3 May 2024 the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office updated the UK Sanctions List on GOV.UK. This list provides details of those designated under regulations made under the Sanctions Act. The following 6 entries have been added to the Global Human Rights financial sanctions regime and are now subject to an asset freeze:

  • Neria Ben Pazi (Group ID: 16486)
  • Noam Federman (Group ID: 16489)
  • Eden Levi (Group ID: 16485)
  • Elisha Yered (Group ID: 16493)
  • Hilltop Youth (Group ID: 16487)
  • Lehava (Group ID: 16488)

  OFSI’s consolidated list of asset freeze targets has been updated to reflect these changes.

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  Spanish national charged after huge Manchester Airport cannabis seizure

  National Crime Agency

  May 3, 2024

  A Spanish national has been charged with drug smuggling offences by the National Crime Agency after eight suitcases packed with cannabis were found at Manchester Airport. 51-year-old Fernando Jacobo Mayans Fuster, from Zaragoza in Spain, arrived into the airport on Wednesday 1 May, having flown from Los Angeles in the US, via London Heathrow. He was arrested after Border Force officers located 278 packages in eight separate bags.