US law chief defends HSBC probe action

President Barack Obama’s nominee for attorney general has defended her office’s handling of a money-laundering investigation involving British bank HSBC.

In 2012 the bank agreed to pay $1.9bn to settle the investigation, in a deal sparing individual executives from prosecution.

Loretta Lynch, who is awaiting Senate confirmation as attorney general, is the top federal prosecutor for the Eastern District of New York, the office which handled the case.

Iowa Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, asked Ms Lynch a series of questions about the Justice Department’s handling of the case, including the decision not to prosecute bank executives.

In written responses received by the committee today, Ms Lynch defended the deal and said it had produced consequences which are “perhaps the most stringent ever imposed on a financial institution”.