Treasury hit Bank of America with $1.2 billion in penalties for money laundering failures. Susan Kokinda traces the bank from Countrywide and the 1980s debt crisis to King Charles’ green finance club, and Bessent’s challenge to the IMF.
Susan Kokinda opens with the more than $1.2 billion in penalties Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's Treasury imposed on Bank of America on October 13 for violating anti-money laundering and sanctions laws, among the largest in Treasury history, after FinCEN found the bank failed to report priority national security risks, including Chinese money laundering networks and illicit finance along the southwest border.
The episode traces the bank's record from Countrywide, Merrill Lynch and its $45 billion TARP bailout back to the petrodollar loans of the 1970s, the 1980s debt crisis and IMF austerity in Latin America, and Tom Clausen's moves from Bank of America to the World Bank and back. It then turns to Bank of America's chairman and CEO Brian Moynihan, chair of the Sustainable Markets Initiative founded by King Charles and of the World Economic Forum's International Business Council, and the Net-Zero Banking Alliance launched in April 2021.
It closes with Secretary Bessent's statement to the IMF–World Bank Annual Meetings in Bangkok on growth, exchange rates and energy, including an initial U.S. contribution to the Nuclear Energy Assistance Trust Fund, and the gap in nuclear power between the OECD and the developing world.
00:00 The Monday Brief
00:58 The $1.2 Billion Hammer
05:52 Time to Rename the Bank of 'America'?
09:15 Bessent Challenges the Whole Model