TD takes US$450 million provision in U.S. money-laundering probe
BNN Bloomberg
Toronto-Dominion Bank has taken an initial provision of US$450 million in connection with U.S. investigations into its anti-money laundering practices, and said it expects additional penalties to come.
Canada’s second-largest bank disclosed the charge in a statement Tuesday after markets closed. It cautioned that the full cost of the fines it might eventually face is “unknown and not reliably estimable at this time.”
Toronto-Dominion is in discussions with three U.S. regulators plus the Department of Justice to settle the matter. The $450 million provision is related to talks with just one of those regulators.
Analysts have previously estimated that the bank might ultimately face fines ranging from $500 million to $1 billion or more.
Manufacturing sales fell 2.1 per cent to $69.9 billion in March as sales of petroleum and coal products and motor vehicles fell, Statistics Canada said Wednesday. Olivia Cross, North America economist at Capital Economics, said the result was not as bad as the early estimate that pointed to a drop of 2.8 per cent, but it still means sales fell 0.9 per cent over the first quarter. "The weakness of manufacturing sales in March suggests that the economy lost momentum heading into the second quarter, matching the message from the earlier preliminary estimates for retail sales and GDP," Cross said in a note. Last month, Statistics Canada released a pair of preliminary estimates for real gross domestic product and retail sales for March that both suggested the data points were essentially unchanged for the month. Driving the manufacturing sales numbers for March was an 8.0 per cent drop in sales of petroleum and coal products to $8.0 billion as volumes fell 6.1 per cent. Sales of motor vehicles fell 7.9 per cent to $4.6 billion in March as sales of motor vehicle parts lost 2.8 per cent. Statistics Canada says retoolings at several major auto assembly plants in Ontario continued to impact auto manufacturing and contributed to the lower sales for the month. Meanwhile, sales of machinery rose 2.9 per cent to $4.5 billion in March. The increase came as sales in all seven machinery industry groups climbed higher, led by commercial and service industry machinery which gained 41.6 per cent. Overall manufacturing sales in constant dollars fell 2.0 per cent in March. Total inventories for the month were largely unchanged at $121.0 billion in March, while unfilled orders fell 0.8 per cent to $104.8 billion. This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 15, 2024.