The bank must pay out $6.731m after confessing to seven breaches of the AML/CFT Act 2009
The High Court has slapped ASB Bank with a $6.731m penalty for violating the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) Act 2009 – the highest payout ordered by a New Zealand court for anti-money laundering violations.
ASB confessed to the seven AML/CFT Act breaches it was charged with. The Reserve Bank of New Zealand | Te Pūtea Matua (RBNZ) had filed civil proceedings against ASB in December 2025.
The RBNZ claimed that ASB did not develop, roll out, or maintain an AML/CFT programme that ticked all the compliance boxes under the Act. Moreover, it deemed ASB’s customer due diligence efforts to be inadequate.
The RBNZ noted that ASB did not report suspicious activity within the Act’s provided timeframe and did not end business relationships in line with the Act’s mandate. It indicated that both ASB’s transaction monitoring system and AML/CFT programme had been lacking for about six years.
“The AML/CFT Act plays an important part in maintaining and enhancing New Zealand’s international reputation and contributing to public confidence in our financial system. Non-compliance with transaction monitoring and reporting requirements denies New Zealand intelligence agencies crucial time-sensitive information that is needed to detect and deter money laundering and terrorism financing from impacting New Zealand communities”, said acting assistant governor of financial stability Angus McGregor in an RBNZ media release.
He explained that transaction monitoring was “a key pillar to detect money laundering and terrorism financing”.
“It is incumbent on banks to ensure their systems and processes are robust and sufficiently recognise and mitigate these risks”, McGregor said.
ASB chief executive Vittoria Shortt said the bank accepted responsibility for the noncompliance.
“We accept responsibility for shortcomings in our transaction monitoring and customer due diligence systems and processes. We accept we didn’t act fast enough to resolve the issue, and I apologise for that”, Shortt said in an ASB media release.
She confirmed that the bank had cleared all transaction monitoring alert backlogs by February 2024. Moreover, it was enhancing systems and processes to bolster its AML/CFT capabilities.
“We have invested significantly in training our people, expanding our financial crime teams and enhancing the technology that supports our financial crime operations. Protecting our customers and the financial system is a core priority for ASB. We remain committed to further strengthening our AML/CFT compliance systems”, Shortt said.
The RBNZ acknowledged that ASB had cooperated with the related investigation.
