KPMG warned ABN Amro for years about money laundering problems

The top management of ABN Amro, led by Gerrit Zalm, was alerted to its negligent anti-money laundering policy from various quarters between 2014 and 2017. The company's auditors KPMG also warned about this, but the bank did nothing about it. The ignored warnings are now part of the criminal investigation into Gerrit Zalm and two fellow board members.

The Justice department blames Zalm and his fellow board members for ignoring the warnings of its auditors KPMG. In doing so, they possibly violated the legislation against money laundering. It was announced on Monday that the Justice Department has named former ABN Amro board members Gerrit Zalm, Joop Wijn and Chris Vogelzang as suspects.

KPMG warned the bank's directors on numerous occasions from 2014 that the bank was taking too little action against money laundering. KPMG believed that ABN Amro should do much more extensive research into the background of customers and the origin of funds flowing through ABN Amro accounts. These so-called compliance issues came up in discussions with the audit committee of the bank.

The minutes of the discussions with the auditor are part of the criminal investigation.

This committee included several directors and supervisory directors of ABN Amro, including Gerrit Zalm. The minutes of the discussions with the company auditor are now in the hands of the judiciary and form part of the criminal investigation. Read further at www.ftm.nl.