FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Banks in Estonia have not but plugged all the gaps of their cash laundering controls. The Baltic kingdom’s regulator advised Reuters, pledging to maintain a clampdown in the united states on the center of one of Europe’s biggest monetary scandals.

Estonia’s efforts to tighten cash laundering controls at its banks follow a scandal at Danske Bank, which has been ejected from the u. S. After coming below investigation for two hundred billion euros ($228 billion) of suspicious transactions that flowed via its Estonian branch. Kilver Kessler, Estonia’s top financial institution supervisor, stated he had also concluded a research of money laundering controls at Swedbank and made tests on other creditors such as SEB.

Kessler started his investigations had proven that, even though there was development in banks’ attitude to cash laundering, there had been “still weaknesses within the control systems.” “Most of the threat is the beyond, but a number of the danger elements are nonetheless there,” said Kessler, who heads monetary watchdog, the Finantsinspektsioon. “We don’t want to peer sloppy banking here.”

Estonia

His feedback underlines the substantial scale of the hassle that affected many banks in the Baltic country that had become a path for money, leaving neighboring Russia. A Swedbank spokeswoman stated it became “fully cooperating with the authorities.” A SEB spokesman said it had ongoing communication with regulators and welcomed any review of its Baltic commercial enterprise.

Last week, Swedbank, beneath research through U.S. Government, suspended two executives at its Estonian enterprise. In April, it admitted to failings in fighting money laundering. Kessler said nearly all banks in Estonia, which has a populace of 1. Three million had earlier treated foreign so-called “non-resident” customers, along with Russia, but this commercial enterprise had gotten smaller.

“It isn’t possible to do all the parties within the market right now,” he said, outlining his efforts to clean up the sector. “There are a number of them. We have our precedence list.” The scandal has tarnished the reputation of the tiny country, which has advertised itself as a virtual hub, providing electronic residency playing cards to foreigners, including Pope Francis.

The Danske case, which followed the unexpected closure of ABLV financial institution in Baltic neighbor Latvia for money laundering discovered with the U.S. Government’s aid, prompted calls to tighten anti-cash laundering regulations. Kessler appealed to bankers privy to wrongdoing to come back ahead.

He said bankers with a “dark judgment of right and wrong” need to come easy. “If you have got something to cover, perhaps you’ll be handled more mildly in case you speak with us,” he stated. “If not, look forward to the regulation enforcement (to return) knocking at your door.”

Earlier this month, Estonia’s Corruption Crime Bureau of the Central Criminal Police said they had detained 3 personnel of Tallinn Business Bank as part of an investigation into alleged cash laundering and bribery. Mati Ombler, who heads the Corruption Crime Bureau, stated in a assertion outlining the motion that “illegal cash flows” were a risk to u . S .’s reputation.

Igor Novikov, chairman of Tallinn Business Bank’s management board, told Reuters by way of email that the investigation turned into directed at personnel and not the bank itself. “During (the) last 9-10 months, the wide variety of debts of non-citizens has been decreased very notably,” Novikov said, referring to foreign clients. “Money laundering controls had been adjusted.”