Three news to start your week: July 8

Three key updates for the week of July 8: SEC charges Silvergate Capital for misleading investors, Peru authorizes external borrowing, and RBI penalizes non-compliant banks.

Three news to start your week: July 8

SEC charges Silvergate Capital and former CEO for misleading investors about compliance program

(SEC)

The Securities and Exchange Commission charged Silvergate Capital Corporation, its former CEO Alan Lane, and former Chief Risk Officer (CRO) Kathleen Fraher for giving false information to investors about their compliance program and the monitoring of crypto customers. The SEC also charged Silvergate and its former Chief Financial Officer, Antonio Martino, for misleading investors about the company's losses from expected securities sales following FTX's collapse. 

All parties charged, except Martino, have agreed to settle the charges. According to the SEC, from November 2022 to January 2023, Silvergate, Lane, and Fraher misled investors by stating that Silvergate had an effective compliance program and monitored its high-risk crypto customers, while in reality, their monitoring system failed to track over $1 trillion in customer transactions.

 

Peru authorized external borrowing up to US$325 million

(La República)

The Peruvian government announced it approved an external debt operation of up to US$325 million to support a comprehensive digital transformation program. This decision falls within the framework of the law that authorizes debt operations for the year 2024. 

By partnering with the esteemed German bank Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau - KfW, the country is set to execute this operation under the guidance of the Ministry of Economy and Finance. However, the Government has not yet disclosed further details about this initiative.

"The aforementioned external indebtedness operation is charged to the amount destined to Balance of Payments Support," the Government said in a decree without specifying further details.

 

RBI penalizes PNB and other banks for regulatory non-compliance

(The Economic Times)

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has penalized Punjab National Bank (PNB) and four other banks for failing to comply with various RBI directives.

PNB has been fined $160,000, making it the fifth bank to face the consequences of the apex bank.

The penalty on PNB was issued on July 3, 2024, for its non-compliance with RBI directions regarding 'Loans and Advances: Statutory and Other Restrictions' and the 'Reserve Bank of India (Know Your Customer (KYC) Direction, 2016'.

The other four banks that the RBI has fined are the Gujarat Rajya Karmachari Co-operative Bank in Gujarat, the Rohika Central Co-operative Bank in Madhubani, Bihar, the National Co-operative Bank in Mumbai, Maharashtra, and the Bank Employees' Co-operative Bank in West Bengal.