Bangladesh Bank to probe Evaly financial transactions

Bangladesh Bank will investigate the financial transactions and other e-commerce activities of e-commerce platform Evaly, reports UNB.

Head of the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) Abu Hena Razee Hasan informed reporters about BB’s move. He said the bank accounts of Evaly and its top executives were frozen after seeing media reports about the e-commerce firm’s “illegal activities”.

The central bank launched this probe following a report published in the daily Prothom Alo a few days ago.

Earlier the Prothom Alo report revealed that Evaly offers consumers all sorts of lucrative deals, with ‘cash back’ offers going up to 100 to 150 per cent. If you buy, for example, Tk 100 worth of goods, you can get the same amount back or even more. Thousands of consumers are being lured in by these almost unbelievable deals being offered by this Bangladeshi e-commerce company. A few are even making a profit, but most are still waiting to see the big bucks.

The report also read this company started with a paid-up capital of Tk 50,000, still had a paid-up capital of 50,000. Evaly.com Ltd was registered on 14 May 2018 with the Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms. Its authorised capital is Tk 500,000 (Tk 5 lakh). The company’s managing director Mohammad Rassel owns 1000 shares worth Tk 10 each. His wife and chairman of the company, Shamima Nasrin, owns 4000 shares. Mohammad Rassel paid Tk 10,000 of the paid-up capital and Shamima Nasrin paid Tk 40,000.

The BFIU, an arm of the Bangladesh Bank, directed all commercial banks and financial institutions through a common letter on 27 August to freeze all bank accounts operated by top executives of Evaly.

A copy the BFIU letter, signed by its deputy director Fuara Khatun, obtained by UNB, shows that it has asked all banks and financial institutions to freeze accounts of Evaly’s chairman Shamima Nasrin, and managing director (MD) Md Rassel.

The letter mentioned both numbers – old NID and smart NID cards – and said the directives have been issued to suspend all transactions to and from the bank accounts of Evaly chairman and MD for the next 30 days under the Money Laundering Prevention Act 2019.

The banks and financial institutions have also been directed to send relevant documents of their opening of bank accounts like account opening form, KYC (know your customer), updated transactions statement, deposits and withdrawal receipts over Tk 5 million, pay order, bank cheques, the information about the payee and depositors, their NIDs with images within five working days from date of the letter’s issuance.