The Third Chamber for Administrative Disputes of the Supreme Court of Justice, with magistrate Carlos Alberto Vásquez Reyes as the opinion author, declared lawful Resolution SBP-0041-2021 of April 19, 2021, issued by the Superintendency of Banks of Panama (SBP), which sanctioned a general-license bank. The decision, dated May 5, 2023 and final on May 23, 2023, closes a dispute that originated in a comprehensive and special inspection conducted between July 25 and August 21, 2019.

The trigger for the special inspection was information received by the SBP from the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the United States Department of the Treasury (OFAC), identifying 48 natural and legal persons allegedly linked to illicit activities of an international nature. Auditors verified that the bank was failing to comply with the 'Know Your Customer – Due Diligence Policy,' as required by articles 26 and 28 of Law 23 of April 27, 2015 on the prevention of money laundering, terrorism financing, and related offenses, as well as article 12 of Executive Decree No. 363 of 2015 and article 23 of Agreement 10-2015, all governing enhanced due diligence for high-risk clients.

The SBP initially imposed fines of B/.320,000 and B/.180,000. After the bank exercised its reconsideration and appeal rights, the SBP Board of Directors reduced them through Resolution SBP-JD-0010-2022 of March 29, 2022 to B/.288,000 and B/.162,000 respectively, for a combined total of B/.450,000. The bank filed suit before the Third Chamber, arguing that the SBP had violated due process by formulating charges without notifying it of the special inspection or allowing it to participate actively in the investigation.

The Chamber rejected the argument. After reviewing the administrative record, it found that the institution had been notified of the comprehensive inspection results on August 27, 2019, filed its defense submissions on January 20, 2020, submitted evidence that was admitted by resolution in May 2020, presented arguments in June 2020, and pursued appeals all the way to the Board of Directors. The Attorney General of the Administration, through Fiscal Opinion No. 1794 of October 24, 2022, endorsed the legality of the sanctioning procedure under SBP Agreement No. 9-2015.

The ruling establishes a significant precedent for banking supervision: the burden of demonstrating that due diligence was applied before onboarding or maintaining accounts for clients identified as high-risk — including those flagged on OFAC lists — falls on the bank itself. The Chamber stressed that the special inspection was carried out within the powers that articles 59 and 66 of Executive Decree No. 52 of 2008 (the consolidated Banking Law) confer on the SBP, and that its simultaneous conduct alongside the comprehensive inspection required no separate notice. For Panama's financial system, the ruling reinforces the validity of the AML sanctioning regime and the duty to continuously update the files of high-risk clients.