Bank of Ghana Reports Bank Fraud Losses of GH¢63 Million in 2023 and Rising Staff Involvement in Fraud

The Bank of Ghana (BoG) has released its BANKS, SDIs & PSPs 2023 FRAUD REPORT, expressing concern over the number of staff involved in fraudulent activities in banks and specialized deposit-taking institutions (SDIs).

Data collated from the three sub-sectors (Banks, specialized deposit-taking institutions, and Payment Service Providers) indicated that overall, the count of fraud cases increased to 15,865 in 2023 from 15,164 in 2022, reflecting a 5% rise. These cases corresponded to a total loss value of approximately Gh¢88 million in 2023 as compared to GH¢82 million in 2022, indicating an increase of about 7%.

Source: BoG - Fraud Loss Values for Banks, SDIs and PSPs, 2022/2023

Data from the Central Bank's 2023 fraud report show that staff-related frauds in banks and SDIs increased from 188 cases in 2022 to 274 cases in 2023, a 46% increase. Of the 274 recorded fraud cases, 211 involved cash theft (cash suppression), which refers to the process of concealing and diverting cash deposits or cash received from a customer, compared to 140 involved in 2022.

The report also disclosed that banks reported 969 incidents of fraud in 2023, which represents a 17% drop compared to 2022’s 1,163. However, financial losses suffered by banks surged to a staggering GH¢63 million in 2023, a 21% increase from GH¢52 million in the previous year.

In 2023, cash theft recorded the highest fraud losses of GH¢14.8 million, a 14-fold rise from the GH¢1 million recorded in 2022. The surge is attributed to recorded cases of cash theft in foreign currency and movements in foreign exchange during the year under review.

Cyber/e-mail fraud came second with a loss of GH¢10.5 million. Fraudulent account withdrawals had a loss value of GH¢8.4 million.

Forgery and manipulation of documents had a loss value of GH¢6.9 million in 2023, although this represents a sharp decline of 78% from GH¢32 million in 2022. The last of the five major types of fraud in banks was cheque fraud with a loss value of GH¢6.1 million.

Source: BoG - Fraud Loss Values 2022/2023