Absa Bank Kenya says it is cooperating with CBK over license suspension

By Bernard Gitonga

Absa Bank formerly Barclays Bank of Kenya Thursday said it was working with industry regulator Central Bank of Kenya to iron out issues that led to the suspension of its foreign exchange dealer license.

“We are in ongoing consultations and discussions with the Central Bank of Kenya to fully resolve all matters raised in the shortest possible time. We remain committed to being a constructive participant in Kenya’s financial markets and to continue contributing to its further development in the interest of all customers and stakeholders,” said Absa Bank Kenya in a statement.

On Thursday CBK ordered the bank to stop foreign exchange dealing between April 9 and April 15 for failing to observe anti-money laundering rules on some trades.

“When the Central Bank of Kenya raised its concerns, pending resolution of the concerns raised, we decided to proactively cancel the two foreign exchange forward transactions concerned,” said a statement from Absa bank Kenya

CBK said Absa flouted several regulations in some forex trading conducted last month.

“The Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) has taken regulatory action against Absa Bank Kenya PLC (Absa Kenya), following Absa Kenya’s failure to provide information about some specific foreign exchange trades that it conducted in March 2020.

In investigating these and other earlier transactions it is evident that Absa Kenya did not have satisfactory assurance of the underlying commercial transactions supporting these trades, as is required, nor did the bank ensure the standard checks on anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) and know-your-customer (KYC) requirements were applied,” said CBK in a statement.