Brown Brothers Harriman Receives Record $8 Million Fine for Anti-Money Laundering Violations
New York-based Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. (BBH) consented to, but did not admit to or deny, the described sanctions and to the entry of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s (FINRA) findings that BBH allegedly failed to have an appropriate anti-money laundering (AML) program in place to monitor and detect suspicious penny stock transactions. FINRA’s findings also stated that BBH did not sufficiently investigate suspicious penny stock activity, which had allegedly been brought to the firm’s attention, nor did BBH fulfill its Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) requirements. Further, FINRA found that BBH’s supervisory system was inadequate and allowed for the distribution of unregistered securities. FINRA’s findings also included that the firm allegedly knew that customers were depositing and selling large blocks of penny stocks and failed to more closely scrutinize these transactions as potentially being red flags for illegal unregistered distribution.
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