Federal regulators fined American Express Company $350 million after identifying widespread, systemic breakdowns in the credit card giant's money-laundering detection programs. The penalties follow parallel regulatory enforcement actions from both the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Reserve aimed at resolving long-standing compliance deficiencies. According to a Thursday announcement from the OCC, the bank's monitoring failures permitted approximately $13 billion in suspected trade-based money laundering to flow through its system undetected over the past decade. American Express noted in a regulatory filing that a portion of the civil money penalty had already been reserved during prior accounting periods, so the resolution will not alter the company's full-year 2026 financial guidance or require adjustments to its operational targets. The consent orders refrain from imposing an asset cap or structural growth restrictions on the New York-based financial services firm, and management said ongoing compliance remediation costs are not anticipated to impair its long-term financial trajectory or its performance outlook for 2027. American Express stock declined almost 2% in after-hours trade following the news.
American Express CompanyOCC and Fed fined American Express $350 million over systemic money-laundering compliance failures.
