Author: Mia

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Article: A Ticking Time-Bomb: Tirana’s Property Market Bubble Fueled by Money-Laundering

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A Ticking Time-Bomb: Tirana’s Property Market Bubble Fueled by Money-Laundering

Tirana Times, 25 May 2021

The average price of residential property in Tirana has more than doubled since 2017. In a recent study which compares price-to income ratio, the capital of Albania was put on par with Munich and Milan. But is it reasonable to view the pricing-out of most prospective homeowners from the market as a negative development? Not necessarily.

Soaring property prices in a specific market are linked to large accumulations of capital, which in a healthy economy come as the result of growth, and the attractiveness of that market to foreign and local investors. The frustration of prospective homebuyers and tenants in Tirana is shared amongst citizens of most European capitals. Continue reading “Article: A Ticking Time-Bomb: Tirana’s Property Market Bubble Fueled by Money-Laundering”

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Article: Five More Plead Guilty to Conspiring to Stage Automobile Accidents in Order to Defraud Insurance and Trucking Companies

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Five More Plead Guilty to Conspiring to Stage Automobile Accidents in Order to Defraud Insurance and Trucking Companies

Department of Justice, 25 May 2021

NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA – United States Attorney Duane A. Evans announced that LOIS RUSSELL (“RUSSELL”), age 61 of Gibson, Louisiana, TANYA GIVENS (“GIVENS”), age 43, of Gibson, Louisiana; HENRY RANDLE (“RANDLE”), age 64, of Gibson, Louisiana; JOHN DIGGS (“J. DIGGS”), age 60, of Thibodaux, Louisiana; and DAKOTA DIGGS (“D. DIGGS”), age 25, of Ft. Smith, Arkansas, entered a plea of guilty today to Conspiracy to Commit Mail Fraud, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 371, arising out of staged automobile accidents with tractor-trailers occurring in New Orleans.

According to today’s guilty plea, on March 27, 2017, RUSSELL, GIVENS, and J. DIGGS conspired with passenger James “Curtis” Williams (“Williams”) to stage an accident with a tractor-trailer at the intersection of Chef Menteur Highway and Downman Road. Damien Labeaud (“Labeaud”) and Roderick Hickman (“Hickman”), who have already pleaded guilty to staging other accidents, also participated in this accident. Hickman, while driving RUSSELL’s car, intentionally struck the 18-wheeler and then fled the scene with Labeaud. RUSSELL advised NOPD that she was the driver and she, along with GIVENS and J. DIGGS, made claims for personal injuries. In total, the victim trucking and insurance companies paid out $272,500.00 for these fraudulent claims. Continue reading “Article: Five More Plead Guilty to Conspiring to Stage Automobile Accidents in Order to Defraud Insurance and Trucking Companies”

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Article: The Bogus “Super Dollars” That Fooled the World for Two Decades

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The Bogus “Super Dollars” That Fooled the World for Two Decades

EXPLICA .CO, 25 May 2021

The forgery was so perfect that even US Secret Service experts could not initially determine whether it was real dollars or a copy before them.

Only after a sophisticated forensic analysis were they able to confirm that they were fakes. But those $ 100 bills were so millimeter perfect who nicknamed them “The false superdollars.” They had the same high-tech color change ink as real US dollars.

They were also printed on paper with exactly the same fiber composition as the originals: three-quarters of American cotton and one-quarter of linen. The recorded images were, if anything, finer than those produced by the United States Bureau of Engraving and Printing.

Kirill Kukhmar Even machines were hard to recognize counterfeit. A little variation, then reported the New York Times, which revealed that they were not original. The United States was very alarmed that counterfeits were passing through the banks undetectedas no one could tell the difference.

These “super dollars” circulated around the world in the 1990s and 2000s. During these years, the United States decided to change the design of the US $ 100 bills twice, but counterfeiters managed to adapt.

They appeared in Denmark, France, Austria, Germany, Latvia, Russia, the Czech Republic, and Ireland. Also in Russia.

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Article: Traders Shouldn’t Get Prison Time in Spoofing Case, Probation Office Says

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Traders Shouldn’t Get Prison Time in Spoofing Case, Probation Office Says

Dave Michaels, 25 May 2021

WASHINGTON—Two former Deutsche Bank traders convicted of manipulating precious-metals prices shouldn’t go to prison, federal probation officers recommended, sparking a backlash from prosecutors who sought terms of almost five years or more.

A federal jury in September convicted James Vorley and Cedric Chanu of wire fraud after a two-week trial over their trading of gold and silver on futures exchanges operated by CME Group Inc. Prosecutors alleged the pair engaged in spoofing, a type of rapid-fire market manipulation that traders and regulators say was once rampant in futures markets. Continue reading “Article: Traders Shouldn’t Get Prison Time in Spoofing Case, Probation Office Says”

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Article: Macon Utilities customers outraged at spike in natural gas prices from February storms

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Macon Utilities customers outraged at spike in natural gas prices from February storms

Michael Steward, 24 May 2021

MACON — A winter storm that pushed several states into crisis, pushed a Missouri county into one of their own. The February polar vortex that collapsed Texas’ power grid and water systems led to a historic increase in natural gas prices.

Macon Utilities, a Missouri company, said they were monitoring the weather, but didn’t anticipate the severity of the storm.

“We were watching the weather with the polar vortex that was happening and we had received alerts that the temperatures were going to be cold,” Stephanie Wilson, General Manager of Macon Utilities, said. “To the severity of wells freezing… because of the temperature — that was not known.” Continue reading “Article: Macon Utilities customers outraged at spike in natural gas prices from February storms”

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Article: Dubai gold trader fined Dh1.35m for failing to comply with anti-money laundering and terrorism financing laws

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Dubai gold trader fined Dh1.35m for failing to comply with anti-money laundering and terrorism financing laws

The National, 24 May 2021

A gold trader in Dubai has been fined a total of Dh1.35 million ($367,597) for eight separate breaches of laws governing money laundering and terrorism financing.

The unnamed company was fined as part of the Ministry of Economy’s extensive inspection campaign into Designated Non-Financial Business and Professions (DNFBPs). DNFBPs are a group of non-financial businesses governed by money laundering rules, and include precious metals dealers, property brokers, auditors and corporate services providers that offer company formation services. Continue reading “Article: Dubai gold trader fined Dh1.35m for failing to comply with anti-money laundering and terrorism financing laws”

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Article: Groundbreaking research provides insight into operations of Italian mafias across Europe

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Groundbreaking research provides insight into operations of Italian mafias across Europe

Michael Steward, 24 May 2021

A groundbreaking new report by researchers in Essex has provided the first analysis into the expansion of Italian mafias across Europe. The report, published by the University of Essex, highlights how criminal groups embed themselves in countries and operate across borders, and the challenges of policing mafia-type crime.

Using Italy as a starting point, the research focused on seven countries – the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Romania, and Switzerland. For mafia groups, territories outside Italy are places where they can consolidate certain business or venture into new ones. The report revealed how mafia groups operate very differently in each country. Continue reading “Article: Groundbreaking research provides insight into operations of Italian mafias across Europe”

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Article: Crown stuffs $630m under the bed, betting on rainy days ahead

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Crown stuffs $630m under the bed, betting on rainy days ahead

Elizabeth Knight, 24 May 2021

At first glance there doesn’t appear to be an obvious nexus between alleged fresh money laundering claims against Crown Resorts revealed during Monday’s Victorian royal commission and the company’s decision not to redeem $630 million of subordinated notes.

For that matter, most wouldn’t join the dots between Crown’s decision to not pay out its noteholders and claims by the Victorian gaming regulator last week that it was misled by Crown about the arrests of 19 of its China staff back in 2016.

Crown paints a portrait of itself as a now conservative company that wants to maintain its liquidity in the face of the COVID-induced sporadic closures of its venues or changes to their operating conditions. Continue reading “Article: Crown stuffs $630m under the bed, betting on rainy days ahead”

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Article: How to Combat Money Laundering in Europe

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How to Combat Money Laundering in Europe

Jesper Berg, 24 May 2021

Good luck finding a major bank in Europe that hasn’t breached money laundering regulations.

In Denmark, the two largest banks, Danske Bank and Nordea, are both currently subject to criminal investigations. BNP Paribas received the highest-ever fine in 2014, when it settled with U.S. authorities and had to pay $9 billion for sanctions violations. Many others — from HSBC and Standard Chartered in the U.K. to Deutsche Bank and UBS and Credit Suisse — have had to answer for offenses.

These cases show that living up to money laundering regulations is difficult, but not doing so is one of the biggest risks to a bank’s reputation. Banks and authorities share the same goal — to stop the bad guys — but both are struggling to find a way forward. While the European Union has proposed establishing a dedicated authority on the crime, company expenses to combat laundering are ballooning. Continue reading “Article: How to Combat Money Laundering in Europe”

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Article: ThetaRay’s New SONAR Solution Unleashes $25 Trillion Cross-Border Payments Sector by Eliminating Money Laundering Risk

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ThetaRay’s New SONAR Solution Unleashes $25 Trillion Cross-Border Payments Sector by Eliminating Money Laundering Risk

PRNewswire, 24 May 2021

ThetaRay, a leading provider of AI-based Big Data analytics, today launched SONAR, the industry’s most advanced financial crime prevention solution for cross-border payments. By providing full visibility across complex, cross-border transaction paths, the SaaS solution enables banks, financial institutions and businesses to increase their volume of transfers without the risk of being exploited for money laundering, terrorist financing, human trafficking, and narco-trafficking. This announcement follows on the heels of ThetaRay’s recent $31M funding round.

Cross-border payments are crucial transactions that connect local economies throughout the world to the global financial system. However, they often involve a complicated sequence of banks operating across multiple currencies in different countries, making it nearly impossible for banks to have transparency into who the beneficiaries are. Banks and regulators are losing trust in industry AML controls and each other as they search for effective measures to confront the threats and reduce and remove risk from their ecosystem. This limits industry growth and prevents underserved economies from accessing global capital. Continue reading “Article: ThetaRay’s New SONAR Solution Unleashes $25 Trillion Cross-Border Payments Sector by Eliminating Money Laundering Risk”

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Article: What Is Megaupload? A Full History of Kim Dotcom’s File-Sharing Website in 2021

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What Is Megaupload? A Full History of Kim Dotcom’s File-Sharing Website in 2021

Aleksander Hougen, 24 May 2021

There have been many dramatic stories over the years involving the internet and copyright infringement, but few are as notorious as that of Megaupload and Kim Dotcom. It’s one hell of a story, but one that’s complicated and often misunderstood. Join us for an answer to the question of “what is Megaupload?” as we look at what happened to the website and what comes next.

Key Takeaways:
Megaupload was one of the leading file-sharing sites on the internet until its takedown in January 2012.
The site’s founder, Kim Schmitz, legally changed his name to Kim Dotcom around the same time he founded Megaupload in 2005.
Dotcom has waged an ongoing legal battle for more than a decade to avoid extradition to the United States for charges of copyright infringement, wire fraud, racketeering and money laundering. Continue reading “Article: What Is Megaupload? A Full History of Kim Dotcom’s File-Sharing Website in 2021”

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Article: Cattle market continues search for a market fix

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Cattle market continues search for a market fix

Michelle Rook, 24 May 2021

Cattle producers have significantly struggled over the last few years, and industry leaders continue to look for a solution to what they call a broken market.

The cattle industry continues to struggle to find a solution to what they call a broken market due to anti-competitive practices and market manipulation by the meat packing industry.

Cattle producers have significantly struggled over the last few years. In 2019, a fire at the Tyson beef plant in Holcomb, Kan., created significant market disruptions. In 2020, COVID-19 related plant closures led to additional supply chain disruptions and processing capacity shortfalls across the country. Department of Justice investigations into both incidents have not produced any results. Meanwhile, the industry is again facing a major disconnect between the record profits meat packers are making as a result of high boxed beef prices and the losses cattle producers are facing in the country with low cash prices. It appears plant labor shortfalls remain an issue. Continue reading “Article: Cattle market continues search for a market fix”

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Article: Convicted London interbank loan trader Tom Hayes joins a private espionage company

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Convicted London interbank loan trader Tom Hayes joins a private espionage company

Agnes Zang, 23 May 2021

Former UBS and Citigroup trader Tom Hayes was found guilty of conspiracy to manipulate the Libor benchmark. He joined a company run by former Black Cube operator Seth Freedman Intelligence agency.

Hayes was released from prison In January And is working hard to overthrow his beliefs. He will join Freedman’s new agency, Red Mist, in June as a consultant, providing intelligence services against white-collar workers and financial misconduct. Continue reading “Article: Convicted London interbank loan trader Tom Hayes joins a private espionage company”

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Article: Macao gambling group retreats from Japan bid amid controversies

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Macao gambling group retreats from Japan bid amid controversies

ZACH COLEMAN, 23 May 2021

HONG KONG — Suncity Group, the Macao-based gambling company, has pulled out of the running for rights to run a casino resort in Japan.

The group is the biggest junket agency in Macao, bringing in high rollers from China and other countries to wager millions in VIP rooms it operates inside other companies’ casinos in the world’s largest betting hub and elsewhere. Through listed arm Suncity Group Holdings, it also runs its own casino resorts near Hoi An, Vietnam and Vladivostok, Russia and is building another in Manila’s Entertainment City gambling zone. Continue reading “Article: Macao gambling group retreats from Japan bid amid controversies”

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