Industrial and Commercial Bank of China: Money Laundering (2017)

Controversy

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC).

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) is the largest international bank in the world in total assets and is the most valuable bank when it comes to market capitalization since 2017. It was in that same year that the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China has allegedly helped launder hundreds of millions of euros to someone all the way in Spain who said needed the money back then. The people that were involved were Wang Jing, a senior officer at the Madrid branch, and Xu Kai a client and alleged top figure in an international money laundering group that was being suspected to using the bank to transfer illegal income to China.They were using multiples account of Spain residences to make the transfer, meaning that they got the residence involved in it as well. A woman, who's name is unknown at the moment, was the first to noticed the transaction that was being made in her account and went to the back to complain. This incident caused the police to get involved and when they wiretapped a conversation between Wand and Xu. The wiretap was used in a court filling that include wiretap transcripts from a series of police investigations starting all the way back in 2009 into Chinese organized crime in Spain. The police suspected that Bank of China has successfully laundered up to 1.2 billion euros ($1.4 billion) out of Spain to China over the years.

With all the clues and evidence right in front of them. Spanish police raided Industrial and Commercial Bank of China last year and made numerous arrest of the people that were involved in the laundering of the money. The people included were Wang Jing, four senior managers,and two more executives. The prosecutor, and everyone else involved, were clearly able to see the damage to the socio-economic order and the national economy that the money that were laundered caused. At the core of the case were the relationship between the bank and a group of clients from Spain's thriving Chinese business community and while the bank played a positive role in the promotion of financing cooperation between China and Spain. Unfortunately, it was because of this relation ship between them that when the invoice for a transfer came between the two, it wouldn't be questioned too much. Even so, they couldn't just send the money and bank it without raising suspicion on them, so they opted to sending it over to bank accounts in their homeland.



Individualism
According to the theory of Individualism, the only goal of any business is to profit and to maximize the profit of shareholders all within rules and limits of the law. It could be argued that Bank of China wasn't causing the laundering. While it was a short group of clients that were employed in Bank of China, This was still against the law as you can't launder money, and this caused Bank of China to face a lawsuit that most likely caused it to lose thousands of money as well as hours of time and business to return all the money back to where they were original supposed to be and to fix the problem with the accounts that were tampered with. Wang Jing, as well as everyone else, didn't do it for business or to increase profit for shareholders. Instead, they did it for themselves. To get extra money then send it over to people all the way in Spain for the sake of a few extra sales and to avoid taxes. In the end, all it did was it got everyone arrested, got multiple customers involved and ruined their business, and caused damage to the economy because of the lost money that were send to Spain. People were hurt by this and they have nothing to show for except for the fact that they are in jail, out of a job, and the people in Spain ended up getting nothing. This is far from counting as individualism since it didn't involved doing better for the business.



Utilitarianism

Spanish police doing their arrest.

Utilitarianism is the practice of giving happiness to yourself and everyone else around you through your business. Wang Jing and his group of clients with their money laundering business didn't make anyone happy once the customers realized that their accounts were being used to transfer money over all the way to Spain to an unknown person that they never even met. The group of clients were able to launder the money successfully, and a lot of it, for a short while.Because of the woman that came that day to complain, the police got permission from the Spanish High Court were all that they needed to investigate Bank of China. One wiretap later and they were able to capture a conversation that Wang had with Xu which was his downfall in the end and cause his plans to get leaked and for it to be ruined. Bank of China is anything but h

appy being used the way they were, the reason for that is they were involved in a scandal that Wang and the clients caused. By being involved in the whole fiasco, they lost precious money and business from other customers since this will caused them to be wary of Bank of China now that they let something like this happen for so long.



Kantianism

Spanish police investigating.

Kant is the belief of good-will and rational thoughts in that actions, and only the action, that you and not on the consequences that your actions might bring. Wang is a good example of Kantianism. He didn't use Bank of China to get all that money for him to use, he did it to send it over to his friend who needed the money which is a sign of good-will, even if it doesn't seem so to everyone else that were involved in the scandal.The clients that were in on Wang's plan mostly did it for the free sales and taxes if they were to work with him. Unfortunately, his actions caused Bank of China to get involved and take the fall for what he did in the largest order as well as heavily damaging the economy for everyone. There was no rational thoughts in his actions. If there was, then he wouldn't have gone through with essentially stealing money from the bank and putting himself, and everyone else, in danger of getting found out and going to jail. If there was any rational thoughts from him, he would have instead worked harder in Bank of China, send in his own money to his friend. The clients would have also not gotten involved in the scandal and put themselves at risk with Wang. While it Kant when it comes to good-will, it wasn't so when it unnecessary harm to everyone else that could have easily been avoided has he had a little bit more thoughts into his plan.



Virtue Theory
Aristotle's Virtue Theory are the normative ethical theories which emphasize virtues of mind and character. Virtue tends to be viewed as positive traits that individuals thrives to get or already have. They are thus defined from single actions or feelings. Going down the list of virtues, Wang and the clients had courage for the reason that they did laundering, something that is considered illegal and would have gotten them in trouble if ever found out. Temperance, they had all that money at their disposal, yet they didn't kept any for themselves and continued to send all of them to Spain. Liberality, they didn't have it for the reason that there were other, safer ideas for them to make the money that they needed to send to Spain. Instead they did something illegal. No truthfulness to be found for the sole reason that Wang and the clients went behind Bank of China as well as the customers and use their accounts for the purpose of sending over money that didn't belong to them in the first place. Their friendliness was only a front for the customers to make sure that they didn't suspected anything. They were nice to each other only because they were stuck together in the crime. Not all information about the case is open to the public, so knowing how modest Wang and the client acted after they had been found out is unknown.



Work Cited

ANGUS BERWICK, D. L. (2017, July 31). How China’s biggest bank became ensnared in a sprawling money laundering probe. Retrieved from Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/icbc-spain/

Angus Berwick, D. L. (2017, September 11). Spain probes ICBC's European unit over money laundering. Retrieved from Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-icbc-spain-investigation/spain-probes-icbcs-european-unit-over-money-laundering-idUSKCN1BM2CV

Chinese bank accused of helping money laundering in Spain. (2017, September 11). Retrieved from APnews: https://www.apnews.com/28930546f6ac40579731b14ec46f27d1

Krick, E. W. (2017, August 7). High-Profile Spanish Money Laundering Investigation of Chinese Bank Raises Questions About Future of Similar U.S. Enforcement. Retrieved from Ballard Spahr: https://www.moneylaunderingwatchblog.com/2017/08/high-profile-spanish-money-laundering-investigation-of-chinese-bank-raises-questions-about-future-of-similar-u-s-enforcement/

Xueqing, J. (2016, March 01). Money-laundering claim sends ICBC directors to Spain. Retrieved from The Telegraph: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/sponsored/china-watch/business/12179319/ICBC-Money-laundering.html