The treasurer of Yuchengco-led Rizal Commercial Banking Corp has resigned from his post amid the ongoing probe on the $81million money laundering case that slipped through the bank’s Jupiter branch.
Raul Victor Tan, treasurer and executive vice-president, resigned effective April 20, RCBC said in a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange on Thursday. The reason for the resignation was not disclosed, reports inquirer.net.
In his place, the board has appointed Carlos Cesar Mercado, who has the rank of senior vice-president, to occupy the post of acting treasurer.
On February 5, some $81 million was wired from the bank account of the central bank of Bangladesh with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to four bank accounts at the RCBC Jupiter branch. The money – which turned out to have been stolen by hackers – found its way to local casinos.
Tan had been with RCBC for seven years. He served as head of treasury group and the retail banking group.
RCBC has slapped penalties – ranging from termination, suspension and warnings – to bank employees who were either involved or amiss in their duties.
Industry sources said Tan – who has appeared in previous hearings conducted by the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee – had been issued by RCBC head office with a written warning for an apparent error in judgement in relation to the Bangladesh remittance. But an internal bank probe had shown that he was not in collusion with RCBC branch manager Maia Santos-Deguito, gatekeeper of the dirty money from Bangladesh.
The RCBC board, for its part, has given Tan clearance from the controversy, thanking him for valuable services and wishing him well in his future endeavor.
‘As head of the investment management team, he was instrumental in growing treasury trading revenues to historic highs, which peaked at over P6 billion in 2012. As head of the retail banking group, low-cost deposits of the retail bank grew at an average of 24 per cent per annum, booked consumer loan referrals moved up by 35 per cent per year. and bancassurance sales reached P1.2 billion in 2015,’ RCBC senior vice-president and corporate information officer Christina Alvarez said in a letter to PSE.
‘RCBC’s internal investigation had previously cleared Mr Raul Tan of any participation in or breach of banking policies with respect to the $81 million money laundering issue,’ Alvarez stressed.
Source: New Age
