US court favors BOC New York branch
( 2002-09-26 09:58 ) (1 )

The Bank of China (BOC) announced on Wednesday that the United States District Court Southern District of New York returned a judgment in favour of BOC New York Branch, accusing John Chou and his "relative" companies of huge amounts of loan fraud.

The BOC New York Branch shall recover from defendants John Chou and his "relative" companies the sum of US$106 million and an additional sum of US$3.6 million for attorneys' fees and costs, according to the judgment.

"The judgment shows that anyone who tries to cheat banks will be punished," a bank spokeswoman said.

It also shows that the BOC has tried its best to beef up its management, the spokeswoman said.

The case led to an investigation and subsequent punishment of the BOC New York Branch for its misconduct by the People's Bank of China (PBOC), China's central bank, and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), a division of the US Department of Treasury.

The BOC has placed great importance on the case and carried out a series of remedial measures to stamp out irregularities and improve internal management.

"The efforts have been acknowledged by both Chinese and US regulators," the spokeswoman said.

The bank is deepening internal reforms to meet the challenges posed by China's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), she said.

The bank will continue to pay attention to and strengthen supervision and management of its domestic and overseas branches to provide quality services to customers in line with its principle of consistent cautious management, she said.

Since March 2000, under the leadership of a new management team, the BOC embarked on the development and implementation of processes to ensure good corporate governance, enhanced information disclosure and the identification of deficiencies in its management and operations, she said.