Money Laundering : Impact on Banks - India
Nirav Modi Scam
Nirav Modi set up over 20 shadow companies, mostly in UAE and Hong Kong, to hide his loan money trail. Interestingly, the owners of all these shadow companies were the employees of his main company, Firestar Diamond.
The scam has dealt a body blow to the lender, Punjab national Bank. It reported a net loss of Rs13,417 crore between January and March 2018. That’s the highest-ever quarterly loss by any Indian bank. Its gross non-performing assets (NPAs) also soared to Rs86,620.05 crore, or 18.38% of its total advances. After its poor performance, credit rating agency Moody’s Investor Services downgraded the bank to “junk,” suggesting it is not worth investing in. In the last couple of months, PNB has made several efforts to salvage its reputation, but investors remain unimpressed. The stock, trading at Rs78.20 as of May 21, 2022 on BSE, has lost half its value since Feb. 14, 2022.
At the end of March, 2018, total capital ratio as per the Basel- III requirement declined to 9.20% as against 11.66% at the end of March 2017. On consolidated basis, it slipped to 9.82% as against 11.98% during the same period.
As per the RBI’s norms, the total capital adequacy, including counter-cyclical buffer should be upwards of 11.5%. So to that extent, there is shortfall as far as capital adequacy of PNB is concerned as on the March 31, 2018.Yes Bank
Publicly listed Yes Bank Limited was established in 2003. In
January 2020, one of the bank’s independent directors, Uttam Prakash Agarwal,
resigned from the board citing governance issues. Then, the RBI scrutinized the
banks’ impaired loan ratio and non-performing assets (NPA). On March 8, 2020,
under provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), the ED arrested the bank’s
former managing director and chief executive, Rana Kapoor. The RBI also placed
Yes Bank under moratorium and subsequently took over the management. A
preliminary assessment by the ED indicated that the NPAs amounted to US$2.6
billion and it identified more than one
hundred shell companies floated by the family members of Kapoor. In a charge
sheet released by CBI and ED in June 2020, Kapoor is among others who have been
accused of cheating, fraud and criminal conspiracy.
The co-founder allegedly had rejected all risk
warnings and continued extending credit facilities to different corporate
accounts in exchange for various monetary benefits and kickbacks. According to
the ongoing probe, the bank’s financial audit conducted by
PricewaterhouseCoopers also confirmed the allegations related to payment of
kickbacks and money laundering involving several firms. In 2015, UBS, a global
financial services company, raised the first red flag about Yes Bank’s asset
quality. Its report stated that Yes Bank had loaned more than its net worth to
companies that were unlikely to pay it back. The bank ignored the alarm and
continued lending aggressively without any due diligence. Negligence and
non-adherence lead to accumulating bad debts.
As of March 14, 2020, Yes Bank was bailed out by the State Bank of India (SBI)-led consortium. The state-owned State Bank of India acquired a 48.21 percent stake in the company under the RBI’s Yes Bank reconstruction scheme. The probe against the people involved is ongoing.
The Dewan Housing Finance Corporation (DHFL)
A prominent housing finance company
in India, has been embroiled in a massive financial scandal worth over Rs
34,000 crore (approximately $4.3 billion). The scam involved accusations of
loan fraud, money laundering, and a web of fake borrowers and shell companies. A consortium of 17 banks claims that DHFL, India its promoters,
and others defrauded them of Rs. 34,615 crores reported in June 2022.
Impact on Economy: This
elaborate scam resulted in massive losses for the bank consortium and eroded
trust in the Indian financial system. The Wadhawan brothers have been
arrested and are facing trial. Investigations and efforts to recover the lost
funds are ongoing.
Loss to
Banks: The scam resulted in a loss of over Rs 34,000 crore (approximately
$4.3 billion) to the consortium of banks that had loaned money to DHFL.
Impact
on borrowers: Borrowers who had taken legitimate loans from DHFL faced
uncertainty due to the company's financial woes.
ABG Shipyard Ltd
Accused in India's biggest bank
fraud case, created 27 "paper companies" and used 38
Singapore-based group entities to divert funds borrowed from ICICI Bank-led
lenders. The Enforcement Directorate's
chargesheet revealed that the diverted funds were transferred to Singapore and
invested in tax havens[21 Sep 2022].
Nearly four months after ABG Shipyard committed ‘India’s biggest
bank fraud,’ totalling nearly Rs 23,000 crore across 28 banks over the course
of nearly five years, it appears that a new bank fraud has taken its place, and
it may be the largest yet. The amount involved in
this fraud is approximately quadruple that of the Nirav Modi case, making it
the largest bank fraud in the nation.
Happy reading,
Those who read this, also read:
1. Impacts of Money Laundering
2. Impacts of Money Laundering on Banks-General
3. Impact of Money Laundering on Banks-Global
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