Imposition of Special Measure Against FBME Bank Ltd., Formerly Known as the Federal Bank of the Middle East Ltd., as a Financial Institution of Primary Money Laundering Concern

In a Notice of Finding (NOF) published in the Federal Register on July 22, 2014, FinCEN found that reasonable grounds exist for concluding that FBME Bank Ltd. (FBME), formerly known as the Federal Bank of the Middle East Ltd., is a financial institution of primary money laundering concern pursuant to Section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act (Section 311). On the same date, FinCEN also published in the Federal Register a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to propose the imposition of a special measure authorized by Section 311 against FBME and opened a comment period that closed on September 22, 2014. On July 29, 2015, FinCEN published in the Federal Register a final rule imposing the fifth special measure, which the United States District Court for the District of Columbia subsequently enjoined before the rule's effective date of August 28, 2015. FinCEN is issuing this final rule imposing a prohibition on U.S. financial institutions from opening or maintaining a correspondent account for, or on behalf of, FBME in place of the rule published on July 29, 2015.