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Estonian banker embroiled in money laundering scandal found dead
The former boss of Danske Bank in Estonia, Aivar Rehe, was found dead on Wednesday after almost two days of searching, police have confirmed.
The 56-year-old banker left his home in Tallinn on Monday, leaving his dog and phone behind. After the search of a nearby forest, and places he usually visited, ended on Tuesday night, police continued looking for the man on Wednesday. Some 40 people, including volunteers, took part in the operation and drones were deployed to cover a wider area.
The body of the banker was eventually found in his backyard, according to local media. The report claims that everything at the scene points toward death by suicide. Police earlier said that the man was a danger to himself.
Rehe headed Danske Bank’s Estonian branch from 2006 to 2015, including the period when the lender was at the center of a €200-billion ($230-billion) money laundering scandal. He was not considered to be a suspect in the scheme.
Estonia’s central bank said that it saw more than $1 trillion in money flows between 2008 and 2017. While the regulator did not deem the transactions suspicious at the time, such a large amount of cross-border money flows is impressive for a tiny European country with an economic output of around $25 billion.
The international financial establishment is known to express concern about the risks of money laundering when the crypto space is mentioned. A string of scandals indicates, however, that traditional banks are not only susceptible to the phenomenon but sometimes complicit, whether knowingly or inadvertently. New chapters have been added to the saga over the last few months that are hurting banks, bankers and their clients.
Denmark has bolstered defenses against shocks to its financial system after a risk-assessment body said the sector’s stability could be threatened by the Danske Bank money laundering scandal.
Thousands of customers of Danske Bank are set to be denied access to their money after the bank said it was closing their current accounts from today. The bank has confirmed that 15,000 current accounts are to be "terminated" and the majority of customers who hold these accounts have yet to shut them down and switch to a new one.
