Banks are being attacked worldwide after failing to stop $2.7 trillion of stolen money funnelled away through their systems.
These documents were leaked from the US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and discovered that 90 banks across the world processed funds that were possibly tied to corruption.
And a few of them trace back to Donald Trump’s associates.
Paul Manafort
The most popular person on this list is the former chair of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign in 2016, Paul Manafort.
Manafort, who was also involved with Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and George Bush’s campaigns, was a key player in the Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation during the 2016 US election.
Banks started to notice odd activity from reports relating to Manafort’s transactions back in 2012, which was 8 years before the scandal started.
Despite this, the banks let him continue transacting even while he was embroiled in a massive political scandal, amongst the biggest ever seen within the US.
JPMorgan Chase (a multinational investment bank in NYC) reported over $437 million in 2017 in suspicious wire transfers to shell companies that were connected to Manafort.
These were through secret jurisdictions – more or less a tax haven in which foreign countries allow someone to avoid financial laws.
These transfers were spread between May 2005 and September 2017.
$55 million of this money was flagged by JPMorgan Chase which were connected straight to Manafort himself.
Manafort went to court and pleaded guilty to witness tampering and conspiracy to defraud the United States in 2019, and was sentenced to 7½ years in jail.
Low Taek Jho
Low Taek Jho – also known as Jho Low – is a Malaysian businessman and the brains behind the embezzlement scheme of over $6 billion dollars from 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), a sovereign wealth fund in Malaysia.
This name may sound familiar if you have seen The Wolf of Wall Street, a popular movie released in 2013 starring Margot Robbie and Leonardo DiCaprio.
JPMorgan Chase and the Bank of New York Mellon both reported over 100 suspicious transfers over the last 7 years that are linked to Jho Low and 1MDB.
This included over a dozen wire transfers from companies that Jho Low owns in order to buy NY penthouse stakes in a hotel near Central Park.
Over $40 million was spent on original artworks by famous painters Vincent van Gogh and Claude Monet.
The former prime minister of Malayasia Najib Razak, who created the 1MDB fund, faces 12 years in prison after being found guilty for financial crimes earlier this year.
Currently Jho Low is in hiding, and his current location is unknown. Most believe it is somewhere in China.
Ruja Ignatova
Ruja Ignatova is famous for inventing a cryptocurrency called OneCoin which had over $5 billion invested into.
The currency ended up being fake and was created through a pyramid scheme.
The Bank of New York Mellon reported $187 million in suspicious payments from a group of companies that tie together with OneCoin.
These companies were transferring money through several different transactions to hide the original, real source. This is known as ‘layering’.
Ignatova was charged with conspiracy to wire fraud, as well as security fraud and money laundering. She has been missing since 2017 and her current whereabouts are unknown.
Her brother, on the other hand, was found guilty by the US court for being involved with the scheme.
Dmytro Firtash
The last big fish on this list is Dmytro Firtash, another tie to US President Donald Trump’s administration. Firtash is also known as a Ukrainian energy baron.
Firtash made his billions by working as the middleman for Gazprom, a gas company in Russia which imports gas to Ukraine at an artificially low price.
He also funnelled money and has been moving billions through US and UK banks for over 15 years.
He is currently fighting extradition to the US.
