NH Nonghyup Bank has received a heavy disciplinary action of an "institutional warning" for offenses including obstructing an inspection by submitting false data to the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS).

According to financial authorities, the Anti-Money Laundering Office of the FSS notified Nonghyup Bank on October 26 of the institutional warning, along with disciplinary measures for employees and officials including unregistered executives—specifically, reduction in salary (6 individuals), reprimand (7 individuals), caution (2 individuals), and 2 matters requiring voluntary resolution.

Sanctions against financial institutions range from the revocation of registration or authorization, business suspension, and correction orders to institutional warnings and institutional cautions, with institutional warnings classified as heavy disciplinary action.

According to the FSS, Nonghyup Bank was found to have submitted tampered customer verification records and other inspection data during an ad-hoc inspection of its overall anti-money laundering (AML) operations conducted last year.

Nonghyup Bank also arbitrarily omitted "third-party customer verification records" requested by the inspection team.

Furthermore, the FSS added that Nonghyup Bank systematically obstructed the inspection by reconfiguring its AML and integrated operation system permissions to restrict system access, preventing the inspection team from properly verifying the actual state of its AML operations.

It was also revealed that Nonghyup Bank repeatedly obstructed the inspection during a regular FSS examination in 2024 by tampering with computer input data and falsely submitting customer verification materials.

Nonghyup Bank also violated customer verification obligations required when opening new accounts or conducting one-off financial transactions through branches, non-face-to-face channels, and third parties during the inspection target period.

The bank modified additional information for customers with a high risk of money laundering without verification and failed to strengthen customer verification when they engaged in financial transactions again.

In addition, from January 2023 to March 2025, Nonghyup Bank failed to report 30 high-value cash transactions of 10 million won or more to the Commissioner of the Korea Financial Intelligence Unit.

The FSS also notified Nonghyup Bank of 9 institutional improvement requirements.

(Photo: Yonhap News)