Puppet Masters
According to the regulator, the banking multinational showed serious "deficiencies" in its attempts to counter illegal financial activities when dealing with soccer's ruling body FIFA, Brazilian oil corporation Petrobras, and Venezuela's state energy company PDVSA.
"To combat money laundering effectively, every relevant department within the bank must be able to see all the client's relationships with the bank instantly and automatically," FINMA said, adding that some progress had been made so far.

Former FBI lawyer Lisa Page arrives for her House Judiciary Committee deposition
Page told lawmakers that in May 2017, after a nine-month FBI investigation, and as Special Counsel Robert Mueller's 'Russiagate' investigation was kicking off, the agency still had no idea whether Donald Trump's presidential campaign actually colluded with Russia.
As far as May 2017, we still couldn't answer the question (of collusion)Page told Republican Representative John Ratcliffe during the closed-door hearing in July, according to documents reviewed by Fox News and reported on Sunday.

Joe Biden who has a penchant for fondling young girls refers to Trump supporters as 'dregs of society'. How rich!
While speaking to the crowd at the Human Rights Campaign dinner in Washington on Saturday night, Biden lamented the fact that "virulent people" and the "dregs of society" have a friend in the White House.
"Despite losing in the courts and in the court of public opinion, these forces of intolerance remain determined to undermine and roll back the progress you all have made," he argued.
Comment: Speaking of 'dregs of society'...
- Joe Biden is Probably a Pedophile
- Creepy Joe Biden heckled at book tour for 'molesting girls'
- 'Weinstein level stuff': Former secret service agent had to protect women from Joe Biden
But he was only repeating what plenty of other people say in private in Germany where I've spent the last couple of weeks, soaking up the atmosphere, people-watching, gauging the public mood in the wake of Angela Merkel's open invitation to perhaps three million immigrants - most of them fighting-age males from Muslim countries.
Three million is higher than the figure admitted by the German authorities, which tend to put it closer to 1.5 million. My source tells me the higher number is closer to the mark.
Comment: See the latest kink in Germany's migrant issues:
'Not our minister': Migrant NGO's demand Germany's Seehofer change stance on migration or resign
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview released on Monday that the bloc could invoke Article 5 on collective defense in the event of a cyber attack by Russia.
"We will never be specific [about] when we will turn to Article 5," Stoltenberg told Axios news portal, responding to strategies for a possible cyber attack in Russia. Stoltenberg added that the alliance was boosting its cyber security and planned to develop cybernetic offensive capabilities.
Comment: Becoming the thing they fear?
In July, the Alliance had already confirmed in a statement after the summit in Brussels that, in the case of a hybrid war, the bloc would step up its Article 5 on collective defense. Meanwhile, US and British troops participated on Sunday in NATO maneuvers on the border between Poland and Lithuania.
Hybrid war refers to the use of combined civilian and 'volunteer' and mercenary combatants in an armed conflict which may include regular state-sanctioned army forces, whether war is declared or undeclared. It also refers to the use of virtual spaces, the internet, and cyber attacks. It is a feature within 4GW or Fourth Generation Warfare.
Comment: NATO's existential search for relevance continues. There seems to be a mechanical timing to the assaults on Russia, one after another, and now from many sources. We are hearing the drums...
In the meantime, in the real world, NATO (read: the US and UK, primarily) have cyber-warfare operations running 24/7, even against their 'members' (read: vassals).
China is apparently reluctant to hold any trade negotiations with the US under the current circumstances as it said it would not talk under pressure, even though it did not completely forgo the negotiations, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing Chinese officials. It also said that the latest moves of the Trump administration might jeopardize the potential trade talks with Beijing, which the US officials themselves had sought.
"China never said it doesn't want to negotiate with the US," Yang Weimin, a former senior economic and foreign policy adviser to President Xi Jinping, said Sunday, as cited by the WSJ. He added, however, that Washington should first "show sincerity" in its desire to resolve the trading dispute. "China is not going to negotiate with a gun pointed to its head," the official noted.
The fate of the talks, which could potentially take place later in September, is still unclear, another official said. "There is a lot of uncertainty right now," the unnamed official told the media, adding that "if more tariffs come out, the Chinese side could very well choose not to go."
Comment: Neither side is backing down - risking the potential to destabilize the financial and manufacturing situations in both countries. See also:
- Report: Trump green-lights tariffs on $200B more Chinese products
- Trump ups the stakes in trade war with China, further targets $200B-worth of imports with tariffs
- Beijing disputes offering Trump a $200B trade surplus cut
According to Novak, "It is better to continue working in the market, Iran being just another exporter that provides stable supplies to the market."
The Russian minister explained that Iran is one of the richest countries in terms of resources and has a "solid standing in terms of its energy capability both in the OPEC, and in the energy markets as a whole. So, I think there will be consequences, I am sure, but we could only comment once they are in place."
Novak added: "We do not know how companies will react, how countries that engage with Iran will react. We will have to see the actual adopted documents/sanctions."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel • President Domestic Intelligence of BfV Hans-Georg Maassen
During an emergency meeting of the ruling coalition last week, Merkel decided that Maassen overstepped the line by interfering with the daily policies of the cabinet, Die Welt reported on Monday. The chancellor reportedly wants to replace him.
Maassen sparked controversy earlier this month by saying in an interview with Bild that he was skeptical about media reports that far-right protesters chased people looking like foreigners during mass rallies in Chemnitz. The protests were in response to the stabbing of a local resident, which resulted in the arrest of people from Iraq and Syria.
Maasen claimed that there was no proof that a video showing white men chasing after migrants was genuine. He has since accepted that it was in fact real, but said that his skepticism of the media reports left too much room for misinterpretation.
"All of a sudden, the country which issues the US dollar starts making steps which are shattering trust in this reserve currency. More and more countries, not only in the East but also in Europe, start mulling ways to minimize their dependence on the US dollar," Peskov told Rossiya TV channel.
"They suddenly realize: A. it is possible, B. it should be done, and C. save yourself if you can, it should be done as soon as possible."
Peskov noted that it is not easy to replace the dollar-dominated system, however, "the fact that the trend of searching for alternatives has begun" is noticeable.
Last week, Russia's second largest bank CEO Andrey Kostin warned that countries will stop using the greenback as a settlement currency because of Washington's aggressive policy. According to Kostin, the US uses the dollar as a weapon, which will inevitably make it unpopular across the globe.
The idea of switching to the use of national currencies in bilateral transactions has recently become more popular for a number of countries affected by US sanctions or trade tariffs. They include Russia, China, Iran and Turkey.
Comment: The buck stops here...and there.
Warships from NATO's 2nd Standing Maritime Group are patrolling Eastern Mediterranean waters, moving closer and closer to the Syrian coast, media reports said, citing Western websites monitoring naval activity in the region.
The NATO flotilla cruising off the Syrian coast reportedly consists of a Dutch frigate, the De Ruyter, a Canadian frigate, the Ville de Quebec, and a Greek cruiser, the Elli.
This information was confirmed by the captain of the Dutch frigate in his microblog.
According to earlier reports, a Los Angeles-Class US submarine, the USS Newport News, armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles, has entered the Mediterranean Sea to join a US naval task force consisting of two nuclear submarines with cruise missiles on board and two Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers, the USS Carney and the USS Ross.
Comment: Short-term interests versus long-term outcomes...the US and its allies should think again.












Comment: Following the banking crash, governments robbed the public to bail out the banks, and the banks were then freed to carry on as though nothing had happened: Fraud, deception, laundering - Bailed out banks still behaving badly and no one's stopping them
See also: