The CEO of Klarna has questioned the role of the Swedish financial regulator, after the buy now, pay later firm decided it would not appeal against the $50M fine it received for breaking anti-money laundering rules.
Sebastian Siemiatkowski, Klarna CEO and co-founder, said the regulator, known as FI, had a “strange role as police, prosecutor, and court”, in a post on social media platform X, posted in Swedish.
Siemiatkowski questioned whether this was a good thing.
He argued: “Where is the debate about whether this is good for society and Sweden? Does FI actually think it's good too?”
He said that over several years, Klarna had tried to garner information from the regulator on how it should interpret money laundering rules.
But he said: “They say their role is not to consult, we are to interpret, then they judge our interpretation.
“Finally, they evaluate our interpretation and we receive a SEK 500 million fine.
“Not because there was money laundering, but because we interpreted ‘wrong’.”
The CEO said appealing the fine was “pointless”, as it would only test whether the regulator followed the law, not whether Klarna's interpretation of the rules was right.
Last month, the buy now, pay later firm, which has filed for a US IPO, was fined $50m and rebuked by the Swedish financial regulator for breaching anti-money laundering rules.
The regulator said that between 2021 and 2022 Klarna had displayed “significant deficiencies” in its risk controls, saying it had not contained any assessment of how Klarna's products and services could be used for money laundering or terrorist financing.
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