PARIS, Feb. 13 (UPI) -- French bank BNP Paribas said it had set aside $1.1 billion to end U.S. concerns it had done business in sanctioned countries.
The bank would become the 10th European bank to make a deal over potential charges of doing business in Cuba, Sudan, Libya or Iran, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.
Federal investigators and the state of New York are investigating the bank, reviewing transactions typically regulated by the Office of Foreign Assets Control.
The bank said an in-house investigation had found "a significant volume of transactions," from 2002 to 2009 were potentially "impermissible under U.S. laws and regulations."
"The bank has presented the findings of this review of this review to U.S. authorities and commenced subsequent discussions with them."
The Journal said the French bank is joining a list of European financial firms that have already paid more than $2 billion to end investigations into business done in sanctioned countries.
The list includes Italian bank Intesa Sanpaolo, fined $3 million in 2013; British banks HSBC, fined $375 million in 2012, Standard Chartered, fined $132 million in 2012, Royal Bank of Scotland, fined $33.1 million in 2013, Barclays, fined $176 million in 2010, Lloyds, fined $217 million in 2009; Dutch bank ING, fined $619 million in 2012; U.S. bank JPMorgan Chase, fined $88.3 million in 2011; and Swiss bank Credit Suisse, fined $536 million in 2009.
