New York state has subpoenaed two of the biggest names in the financial consulting industry, Promontory Financial and PricewaterhouseCoopers, in connection with their work on money-laundering cases, according to a person familiar with the inquiry.
The orders are part of a broader investigation into the consulting industry’s relationship with Wall Street. Consultants are supposed to work at the behest of regulators to provide objective assessments of a firm’s problems. But lawmakers have raised doubts about the independence of consultants handpicked by financial firms accused of wrongdoing.
According to the person familiar with the case, the department is looking into Promontory’s work last year for Standard Chartered Bank. Asked by the bank to conduct a review for evidence of money laundering, Promontory determined that the British bank had illicitly funneled about $14 million to Iran. The sum fell well short of the assessment by the New York financial regulator, which accused the bank of processing at least $250 billion in illicit transactions.
In the case of PricewaterhouseCoopers, the department is investigating the firm’s review of foreign transactions processed by the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ from 2002 and 2007. In June, the Japanese bank agreed to pay $250 million to settle New York charges that it cleared some 28,000 transactions totaling $100 billion for countries facing U.S. sanctions, including Iran, Sudan and Burma.
Detailed news link: click here