U.S. rule limits accounts for some Canadians: Royal Bank

Last Updated: Tuesday, January 16, 2007 | 5:36 PM ET

CBC News

The Royal Bank says U.S. rules prevent it from offering American dollar bank accounts for Canadians with certain dual nationalities.

A spokesman for Canada's biggest bank was responding to a report broadcast Monday by Radio-Canada that said the Royal Bank has refused for the past nine months to open U.S. dollar accounts for Canadians who may be dual citizens of Iran, Iraq, Cuba, Sudan, North Korea and Myanmar.

"These are rules that we don't necessarily agree with or support," Royal Bank vice-president David Moorcroft told CBC News. "These are U.S. government rules."

"What the U.S. government says [is] if you want to operate a U.S. dollar account and use it to make payments through the U.S. clearing system ... then we have to live with their rules," he said.

The story came to light after the Royal Bank told some Montrealers with Iranian citizenship they couldn't have U.S. dollar accounts.

"They [the Royal Bank] explained to me that they needed to verify if I had another citizenship and I told them, 'Yes, I was born in Iran,' " said Payam Eslami, an Iranian-born Canadian. "And they just told me that then they would have to refuse opening that account for me."

Eslami said he has lodged a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

'Restrictions apply to every bank'

Moorcroft said the restrictions apply to every bank around the world. "This isn't a rule about Canada or Canadian banking; it's a rule about people who want to use U.S. dollars to do business with the United States," he said.

"We have to respect that they have the right to govern the use of their currency in their country."

Arvind Jain agreed that if Canadian banks want to offer U.S. dollar accounts, then they must comply with the U.S. rules. 

"I don't think the Canadian banks can say that they will selectively disobey the orders of the U.S. Treasury, which is the basis of a U.S. dollar account," said Jain, finance professor at the John Molson School of Business at Concordia University.

Moorcroft disputed a Radio-Canada assertion that the federal Department of Finance was not aware of the policy.

"They are aware of it and every government around the world is because it's not a requirement of just Canada. It's a requirement of all governments and all financial institutions everywhere in the world."

The U.S. Treasury Department has tightened rules dealing with terrorism and money laundering put in place after the Sept. 11 attacks.