UPDATE 1-Bank of America says president to resign

Mon May 24, 2004 04:58 PM ET
(Adds quotes and details)
CHARLOTTE, N.C., May 24 (Reuters) - Bank of America Corp. (BAC.N: Quote, Profile, Research) President Eugene McQuade plans to resign from the No. 2 U.S. bank and its board of directors effective June 30, the company said on Monday.

McQuade, 55, was a driving force behind Bank of America's $48 billion purchase of FleetBoston Financial Corp., completed on April 1. McQuade became Fleet's chief operating officer in 2002 and was previously its chief financial officer.

Kenneth Lewis, Bank of America's chief executive, said in a statement McQuade "felt it was time to pursue different challenges and a new chapter in his career." The business units that McQuade oversaw are being realigned.

McQuade is the most senior official from Fleet to leave the combined bank since the merger. Charles "Chad" Gifford, who had been Fleet's chief executive, became Bank of America's chairman.

http://www.reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml?
type=bondsNews&storyID=5240652

At Riggs, problems passed on with legacy
Joe L. Allbritton won control of Riggs Bank in 1981 and used it as a launching pad into Washington`s top business and political circles. He assiduously cultivated "The Riggs" cachet as the bank for foreign governments and diplomats and steadfastly refused to sell the institution even as most of his competitors sold out, The Washington Post reported. Riggs has cultivated the diplomatic community and one quarter of its $4 billion in deposits come from that source. "My pride in Riggs has been paramount in my activities," he said in an interview when he retired in February 2001. "And you know, if you have just enough money, you`ll do more for pride than you`ll do for money…. My object was to put Riggs in a position where it could be the survivor. It is that." But when he bequeathed Riggs to his son Robert after retiring, he also passed on Riggs`s long-simmering problems complying with banking secrecy laws. Most controversial has been the use of hundreds of millions of dollars in funds controlled by the Saudi embassy in Washington, as well as suspicious transactions involving officials of Equatorial Guinea.

http://www.diplomatictraffic.com/embassy_briefs.asp?ID=Americas



The action followed the $25 million civil fine against the midsize Washington bank, which has a near-exclusive franchise on business with the capital’s diplomatic community. The fine, which had been expected, is the largest ever imposed on a financial institution for such violations, experts said.


The FBI and regulators have investigated, for possible connections to terrorism financing, large cash transactions in Riggs accounts controlled by Saudi diplomats.

The Senate Finance Committee chairman, Republican Charles Grassley of Iowa, recently asked the panel investigating the Sept. 11 attacks to examine Saudi transactions at Riggs and FleetBoston Financial Corp.

“Riggs Bank deserves every penny of this huge fine,” Grassley said Thursday. “Banks have a patriotic duty, not to mention legal requirement, to report suspicious activity. When banks look the other way, they put our national security at risk.”

Grassley said members of the bank’s board of directors should be held to account.

The Treasury regulators had earlier accused Riggs of failing to comply with a law requiring banks to notify the government of suspicious transactions. The bank also had been classified by the comptroller’s office as a “troubled institution” for not complying fully with a July 2003 consent order under which it agreed to strengthen its anti-money laundering controls.

more
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4973033 /


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=1602186

The FBI and regulators have investigated, for possible connections to terrorism financing, large cash transactions in Riggs accounts controlled by Saudi diplomats.

I saw your post and thought bush* was packing his bags!

Banks are the hub in BFEE