Fraud, Money Laundering and Narcotics

Fraud, Money Laundering and Narcotics. Impunity of the Banking Giants. No Prosecution of HSBC

By Tom Burghardt

In another shameful decision by the US Department of Justice, earlier this month federal prosecutors reached a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) with UK banking giant HSBC, Europe’s largest bank.

Shameful perhaps, but entirely predictable. After all, in an era characterized by economic collapse owing to gross criminality by leading financial actors, policy decisions and the legal environment framing those decisions have been shaped by oligarchs who quite literally have “captured” the state.

Founded in 1865 by flush-with-cash opium merchants after the British Crown seized Hong Kong from China in the aftermath of the First Opium War, HSBC has been a permanent fixture on the radar of US law enforcement and regulatory agencies for more than a decade.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/fraud-money-laundering-and-narcotics-impunity-of-the-banking-giants-no-prosecution-of-hsbc/5317406