Tag: Banking

Regulatory Watch News

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  Treasury Takes Action Against Violent Far-Left Terrorist Networks

  OFAC

  August 26, 2026

  WASHINGTON—Today, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) took action to counter the growing threat posed by violent far-left terrorist groups. OFAC sanctioned Autistici Inventati, an Italy-based entity that supplies specialized digital architecture, tools, and services for Antifa cells and other violent far-left extremists, including a foreign terrorist organization; Palestine Action, a United Kingdom (UK)-based organization proscribed as a terrorist group by the UK government in July 2025; and the transnational group Masar Badil, which operates as a front for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization.

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  Investigation ‘Echo’: EPPO arrests five suspected ringleaders in probe into VAT fraud involving wireless earbuds

  European Public Prosecutor's Office

  August 26, 2026

  (Luxembourg, 26 August 2026) – At the request of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office in Munich (Germany), five individuals were arrested today in Czechia, suspected of being the organisers of a criminal VAT fraud scheme involving the sales of wireless earbuds. As part of this investigation, code-named ‘Echo’, assets were also seized in Czechia, Germany and Lithuania. It is understood that the suspects are the ringleaders of an organised crime group that has been operating a VAT fraud system involving AirPods since at least 2019, causing an estimated damage of €20 million between 2019 and 2023.

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  Wise Europe SA: Bafin sets fine

  BaFin

  August 26, 2026

  The German financial regulator BaFin has imposed fines totaling €16,000 on Wise Europe SA. This is due to the company's failure to submit reports to BaFin's account comparison platform and its breaches of disclosure obligations. The Brussels-based institution had neglected for an extended period to report its account model, offered to consumers in Germany, to BaFin's account comparison platform.