Category: Asia-Pacific

Regulatory Watch News

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  Settlement Agreement between the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control and Adani Enterprises Limited

  OFAC

  May 18, 2026

  The U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) today announced a $275,000,000 settlement with Adani Enterprises Limited (AEL), an Ahmedabad, India-based company. AEL agreed to settle its potential civil liability for 32 apparent violations of OFAC's Iran sanctions. From November 2023 to June 2025, AEL purchased shipments of liquified petroleum gas (LPG) from a Dubai-based trader purporting to supply Omani and Iraqi gas. Red flags should have put AEL on notice that the LPG actually originated from Iran. During this time period, AEL caused U.S. financial institutions to process 32 U.S. dollar denominated payments totaling approximately $192,104,044 for the shipments.

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  Romania: EPPO investigates €3.5 million fraud involving 237 EU-funded agricultural projects

  European Public Prosecutor's Office

  May 18, 2026

  (Luxembourg, 18 May 2026) – The European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) in Bucharest (Romania) is leading an investigation into suspected procurement and subsidy fraud involving non-repayable EU funding to support small farms and young farmers. Searches were carried out in Dâmbovița County on 13 May 2026 and one suspect was arrested.

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  FCA and Bank of England set out shared vision for tokenisation in UK wholesale markets

  Bank of England

  May 18, 2026

  UK financial firms can adopt tokenisation and distributed ledger technology (DLT) with greater confidence, as the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Bank of England set out a shared vision and seek industry views on the future of UK wholesale markets. Tokenisation is the process of creating a digital representation of a real-world asset — such as a share, bond or unit of currency — on a digital ledger. It has the potential to streamline wholesale markets, making everything from issuing securities to managing assets faster and more efficient. Along with greater functionality this could support market efficiency and resilience while lowering costs.