Pecunia non olet.

The Bank of Credit and Commerce International was built so that no supervisor ever saw the whole: a holding company in Luxembourg, operating banks split between Luxembourg and the Cayman Islands, the head office in London. Behind the structure: secretly controlled banks, fictitious loans, hidden losses — and accounts used to launder money for drug traffickers and the regime of Manuel Noriega.

Cartel cash deposited in Mexico flowed into HSBC's US bank, where Mexico was rated low risk and enormous volumes went unmonitored. US authorities found that at least US$881 million of drug proceeds was laundered through the group; sanctions violations were added to the file.

A digital currency service that let anyone open an account with nothing more than a name and an e-mail address — real or not. Funds moved through third-party exchangers, so the service never touched a bank account in its users' names. It became the bank of choice for cybercrime.

The Estonian branch of Denmark's largest bank built a highly profitable portfolio of non-resident customers, mostly from Russia and other former Soviet states, on IT systems separate from the group. A whistleblower raised the alarm in 2013; the bank's own investigation later found that a large share of the payments was suspicious.

Money raised for Malaysia's sovereign development fund was diverted by officials and their associates through shell companies and bank accounts on several continents, then spent on luxury property, art, a superyacht and even the financing of a Hollywood film.

A payments company in Germany's blue-chip index reported revenue routed through third-party acquiring partners in Asia and cash held on trustee accounts in the Philippines. The cash was never there. Journalists and short-sellers who raised questions were targeted instead of heard.

The world's largest crypto exchange let many users trade without identity checks, served US customers while claiming not to, and processed transactions with users in sanctioned jurisdictions.

US authorities found that the bank's monitoring left the vast majority of its transaction volume unchecked for years, while budgets were kept flat. Laundering networks moved hundreds of millions of dollars through its branches, helped in some cases by bribed employees.