The Globe and Mail reports in its Saturday edition that TD Bank boss Bharat Masrani wants people to believe that TD has taken "full responsibility" for the "serious failures" of its U.S. anti-money-laundering program. The Globe's Rita Trichur writes, however, that he and other senior leaders spent years playing down these lapses and they still fail to publicly grasp what just happened. Sure, Mr. Masrani and other senior leaders expressed contrition. Their message rings hollow. "TD Bank created an environment that allowed financial crime to flourish. By making its services convenient for criminals, it became one," Attorney-General Merrick Garland said. That stunning revelation should have prompted executives to finally come clean with investors. Instead, they offered recycled talking points while downplaying their culpability -- you know, a few bad apples. Worse still, it is a black eye for Canadian regulators, including the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) and the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FinTRAC). "This program will be subject to oversight by U.S. regulators," the Federal Reserve Board stated. This means the U.S. has lost confidence in Canada's regulators.
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