Banks refusing or ending business accounts on money-laundering grounds: Yin Yang v ING (Supreme Court 2021) and the Amsterdam exit cases of 2025 and 2026

The judgments

The question

Every company needs a payment account. Without one it cannot pay salaries, receive invoices or settle taxes, and in the Netherlands, where cash is in retreat, the point is not theoretical. At the same time, banks are gatekeepers under the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (Prevention) Act (Wwft): they must know who their clients are, understand where the money comes from, and stop when they cannot. The result is a recurring dispute. A bank ends a business relationship, or refuses to enter into one, citing money-laundering, sanctions or reputational risk; the client replies that no other bank will now take it and that its business will die.

This review analyses how the Dutch courts resolve that conflict. The leading judgment is the Supreme Court’s decision of 5 November 2021 in Yin Yang v ING, which held that banks may, in special circumstances, be obliged to provide a payment account to a legal person. It is read together with the lower-court decisions and the Advocate General’s opinion in that case, and with two recent judgments of the Amsterdam Court of Appeal: 28 April 2026, in which ABN AMRO was ordered to continue the accounts of a manager of UN-sanctioned Libyan state funds, and 11 November 2025, in which ING’s exit from an aviation maintenance and logistics company over a possible sanctions breach was upheld. The material matters to founders and CFOs of cash-intensive or internationally structured businesses, to advisers handling a bank’s due diligence questionnaire, and to compliance teams deciding whether an exit will survive a court’s scrutiny.

The legal framework

Freedom of contract and the bank’s special duty of care

The starting point is private law. A bank, like anyone else, is in principle free to decide with whom it contracts. Existing relationships are governed by the General Banking Conditions (Algemene Bankvoorwaarden, ABV); the 2026 judgment refers to Article 35 ABV as the clause under which a bank may in principle end the relationship, and the 2025 judgment applies the ABV 2017. A contractual power to terminate is, however, subject to reasonableness and fairness: the courts ask whether termination is “unacceptable by standards of reasonableness and fairness”. The judgments reviewed here do not cite a provision for this test; the Advocate General in Yin Yang lists Article 6:248 of the Civil Code among the open norms from which a bank’s duties derive (para. 3.2).

Where the contract has already ended, the claim moves outside contract. Advocate General Hartlief explained in Yin Yang (paras 3.2–3.10) that the bank’s “special duty of care” (bijzondere zorgplicht) developed by the Supreme Court flows from its role in society and rests, towards non-clients, on the standard of due care in Article 6:162(2) of the Civil Code: what unwritten law regards as proper in society. The Amsterdam Court of Appeal added that, as regards property law, a legal person is equated with a natural person unless the law provides otherwise. That is the rule of Article 2:5 of the Civil Code, although the court stated it without citing the article.

The consumer’s right to a basic payment account

For consumers the legislature has spoken. Article 4:71f of the Financial Supervision Act (Wft), introduced in 2016 to implement the Payment Accounts Directive 2014/92/EU, requires a bank that offers payment accounts to consumers in the Netherlands to allow consumers lawfully resident in the EU to open and use a basic payment account. As the Advocate General summarised it (para. 3.11), the bank must refuse the application if opening the account would prevent it from complying with the Wwft (Article 4:71g(1) Wft), may refuse on a limited number of other grounds (Article 4:71g(2)) and may close the account only on listed grounds (Article 4:71i(1)). These provisions are outside our translations. The right applies only to consumers. The question in Yin Yang was whether anything comparable exists for companies.

The Wwft: customer due diligence and the duty to exit

The Wwft supplies the regulatory side. Under Article 3(1) Wwft an institution must conduct customer due diligence. Article 3(2) lists what that due diligence must enable it to do: identify and verify the client (point (a)); identify the ultimate beneficial owner and, for a legal person, understand its ownership and control structure (point (b)); establish the purpose and intended nature of the relationship (point (c)); and conduct ongoing monitoring, “including, where necessary, an inquiry into the source of the funds used in the business relationship or the transaction” (point (d)). Due diligence is not a one-off exercise at onboarding: Article 3(5) requires it also where there are indications of money laundering (point (c)), doubts about previously obtained data (point (d)) or where the risk of an existing client’s involvement gives cause (point (e)), and Article 3(7) requires the institution to tailor it demonstrably to risk.

Article 5(1) prohibits entering into a business relationship or carrying out a transaction unless due diligence has produced the result required by Article 3(2)(a), (b), (c), (e) and (f). The provision at the centre of the exit cases is Article 5(3), which in our translation reads:

If an institution cannot comply with Article 3(1) to (4) and (13)(a) in respect of a business relationship, the institution must terminate that business relationship.

Two related provisions frame the practical consequences, although none of the judgments discusses them. Where the risk is higher by nature, Article 8(1) requires enhanced due diligence, and Article 8(3) requires an institution to examine the background and purpose of unusually large transactions and transactions without an apparent economic or lawful purpose. And under Article 16(4)(b) the reporting obligation applies where a relationship is terminated under Article 5(3) and there are also indications of money laundering or terrorist financing.

Our translation reflects the Act as in force from 1 July 2026; our source records an amendment of Article 5 by Stb. 2025, 262. We have not compared the wording that applied at the time of each judgment, and none of the judgments turns on the exact text.

Yin Yang v ING: the facts and the earlier proceedings

The business and the exit

Since October 1994 the Yin Yang group has operated Saunaclub Yin Yang in Roermond, a meeting centre on the Freikörperkultur model. Visitors pay an entrance fee of €60 to use the facilities and may have sex with other visitors. A foundation, Stichting CS Bedrijven, collects the entrance fees and distributes them under a fixed key to three operating companies. The group banked with ING, and CS Bedrijven had an agreement for “packaged deposits” (verpakt afstorten) allowing cash to be deposited in sealbags (Supreme Court, para. 2.1(i)–(ii); AG, para. 1.4).

At the end of November 2016 the police searched the club, finding a small quantity of drugs, cash and, in the building and in visitors’ cars, pepper spray, a taser and a stiletto. After press coverage ING carried out a customer review. On 10 March 2017 it ended the cash-deposit agreement with immediate effect, and on 14 April 2017 it terminated all banking relationships on three months’ notice. It pointed out that in the year from February 2016 to February 2017 €4,839,802.77 had been deposited in cash against €920,257.38 in card payments, including 1,210 notes of €500 and 650 notes of €200, and that the group had not provided enough information on the origin of these funds (para. 2.1(iii)–(v); Court of Appeal 2020, para. 2.6).

Four rounds of interim proceedings

What followed was a series of summary proceedings (kort geding) set out in para. 2.1 of the Supreme Court’s judgment. In the first, the preliminary relief judge refused relief on 24 May 2017; on appeal the Court of Appeal ordered ING on 13 July 2017 to continue the relationship with CS Bedrijven until 1 January 2018. That court considered, in a passage quoted in the 2020 judgment (para. 2.7), that the group had to accept the heightened risk inherent in its business and could be expected to reduce cash, refuse large notes, and implement an admission policy and an administrative system enabling it, and if necessary its bank in carrying out its obligations under Article 3(2) Wwft, to investigate the source of the cash flows. The club stopped accepting €500 and €200 notes from 15 July 2017, encouraged card payments with discounts and sent its staff on a Wwft course.

On 1 November 2017 the Public Prosecution Service informed the directors that they would be prosecuted for laundering €140,000 and unlicensed exchange transactions, and that they were suspected of forgery because the accounts appeared not to match actual turnover. ING ended the CS Bedrijven relationship as of 1 January 2018; a second claim failed, the Court of Appeal granting only an extension to 16 February 2018. On 8 June 2018, however, the prosecution wrote to ING that the investigation had not revealed facts pointing to culpable use of the business accounts and that compliance had “improved considerably”. On 25 June 2018 the directors settled the charge of three unlicensed exchange transactions, and in early July 2018 the case against the companies was dropped (para. 2.1(vi)–(xi)).

A third and fourth claim initially succeeded: on 2 November 2018 (corrected on 23 November 2018) and 17 January 2019 the preliminary relief judge ordered ING to continue. On 30 July 2019 the Court of Appeal quashed those decisions. It held that whether termination was unacceptable had to be judged on the facts at the time of termination, that the dropped case and the settlement did not change that, that the mayor of Roermond had meanwhile closed the club for one year from 25 February 2019 under Article 13b of the Opium Act, and that the group’s measures had not adequately addressed ING’s concerns (para. 2.1(xv)). The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal against that judgment on 5 March 2021 (ECLI:NL:HR:2021:347, cited in the judgment) under Article 81(1) of the Judiciary (Organisation) Act, that is without substantive reasons. On 5 August 2019 ING confirmed that the relationships had ended and announced that it would close the accounts.

The fifth claim: a new contract under the duty of care

In a fifth summary proceeding, started by writ of 5 September 2019, the group changed tack. It argued that even if the relationships had validly ended, ING’s non-contractual duty of care required it to enter into new ones, assessed on present facts rather than on “outdated assumptions of almost three years ago” (Court of Appeal 2020, para. 3.5).

The preliminary relief judge of the Amsterdam District Court refused relief on 15 October 2019. The judge accepted that the bank’s role in society creates a special duty of care also towards third parties, whose scope depends on the circumstances (para. 4.3). But the dropped prosecution did not alter the “very large risk of money laundering” created by a business model guaranteeing complete anonymity and relying heavily on cash (para. 4.4):

Whatever the case may be, the claimants’ business model evidently compels them to attach more importance to guaranteeing anonymity to their customers than to offering means of checking the origin of that money. That choice is at their own risk.

The duty of care did not require ING to rank the group’s interest in access to cashless payments above the general interest in the integrity of the financial system and its own reputational interest, “not even if that would mean the end” of the business. The group was ordered to pay costs of €1,619; the court found no abuse of procedure because the basis of the claim differed from the earlier cases (para. 4.5).

The Court of Appeal: a payment account, but no cash

The Amsterdam Court of Appeal took a different view on 21 January 2020. Para. 3.6 sets out the principle that the Supreme Court later endorsed:

The principle of freedom of contract means that everyone has the right not to be obliged to enter into a contractual relationship with another. Banks have this right too. This right is fundamental and weighty, but it is not unlimited. […] It is also a matter of common knowledge that it is virtually impossible to take part in society, let alone to run a business, without a payment account at a bank. This applies not only to natural persons but also to legal persons.

The fact that Article 4:71f Wft applies only to consumers did not mean that banks’ freedom of contract towards legal persons could not be restricted at all; a bank could therefore “in special circumstances” be obliged to contract with a legal person. The court accepted that the old relationships had validly ended, but held that whether ING had to enter into a new relationship was to be assessed as at the date of its own judgment (ex nunc), not the date of termination (para. 3.7).

It then split the claim in two. As to cash, three undisputed facts – customers’ identity was not checked and their data not recorded, about 80% of entrance fees were paid in cash, and the group operated in the integrity-sensitive “relax” sector – meant that ING could reasonably refuse anything that facilitated cash deposits, “even after the measures” taken (para. 3.8). If the club could not be run profitably without cash facilities, that was the group’s own risk. More lenient treatment of other businesses in the sector by other banks made no difference (para. 3.9), and ING could rely on its anti-money-laundering policy having become stricter since it first agreed to the cash arrangement (para. 3.10).

As to a payment account without cash facilities, the balance tipped the other way (para. 3.12). The group had shown, with written refusals by banks between April 2017 and September 2018, that it had made sufficient efforts to find another bank; the refusals gave the impression that it was often turned away before it could explain its business. A payment account without cash facilities carries a smaller risk of money laundering, so ING’s interest in avoiding that risk was “less severely affected”; there was therefore a disproportion between the parties’ interests. The search of 2016 and the suspicions against the directors did not alter this, since they had ended in a settlement and a dismissal and it was not plausible that the suspected acts had in fact occurred (para. 3.14). The club’s closure carried at most relatively minor risks for an account without cash. Nor could ING rely on loss of confidence:

ING Bank has not put forward sufficient facts and circumstances on the basis of which it is objectively justified that it has lost the confidence required for offering a payment account without facilities for depositing cash.

ING was ordered to enable each of the seven group entities to hold a payment account, without cash facilities. The order was declared provisionally enforceable; no penalty payments were attached because ING had undertaken to comply, and the court rejected ING’s argument that it was thereby giving a constitutive judgment in summary proceedings (para. 3.15). ING’s cross-appeal alleging abuse of procedure failed (para. 3.16), and costs were set off.

The Advocate General’s opinion

ING appealed on four grounds: that the court had wrongly limited its freedom of contract (ground 1), had disregarded the relevance of the earlier valid terminations (ground 2), had wrongly found an obligation to provide an account (ground 3) and a consequential ground (ground 4). The group cross-appealed against the refusal of cash facilities (AG, paras 4.1 and 5.1).

Advocate General Hartlief, in his opinion of 12 March 2021, advised dismissing both appeals. On ground 1 he reasoned that the special duty of care rests on the open standard of Article 6:162(2) Civil Code, which can require action as well as abstention, so that a duty to contract is not excluded in advance (paras 3.9 and 4.6). He pointed to the “imbalance of power”: refusing a payment account can exclude a party from society (para. 3.10). Although he sympathised with literature arguing for a general right to a business account, he considered that, without legislation, freedom of contract remains the starting point and a duty to contract arises only in special circumstances (paras 3.14–3.15). Contrary to ING, that duty does not require abuse of rights or unacceptability; it can arise “already” where refusal conflicts with what is proper in society (para. 4.13). On the Wwft he observed that the court of appeal had weighed ING’s interest in avoiding money laundering, “also with a view to” the Article 5 prohibition, and that by limiting the account to one without cash the court implied ING could comply with that provision; the situation in which a bank has real doubts whether it can comply with Article 5 was therefore not at issue (paras 4.16–4.17).

On ground 2 and the moment of assessment, the Advocate General accepted that two different tests apply. The validity of a termination is judged ex tunc; the question whether a new relationship must be entered into is judged ex nunc (paras 4.27–4.28). A previous valid termination is a relevant circumstance but not decisive. It may make a duty to contract less likely where nothing has changed, or more likely where the grounds for termination later turn out not to have existed, or appear in a different light (para. 4.26). He called this a “back door” and found the resulting legal uncertainty acceptable given the consequences of an exit for the former client (paras 4.25 and 4.28).

On the cross-appeal he relied on DNB’s Guideline on the Wwft and Sanctions Act (December 2020 version), which states that cash-intensive clients may not be refused categorically but require extra risk-mitigating measures (paras 5.5–5.6). About 80% cash was far above the 32% of point-of-sale payments made in cash nationally in 2019, at an average of €14.10, and above the average of 26.4% (highest 59%) among nine comparable businesses banking with ING (paras 5.9 and 5.17). Because visitors’ data were not recorded, the new till system could not show where the cash came from (para. 5.26). He did note that the court of appeal had wrongly treated as undisputed that customers’ identity was not checked, but held that this did not affect the outcome (para. 5.20).

The Supreme Court’s judgment

The Supreme Court dismissed both appeals on 5 November 2021. It gave reasons on sub-grounds 1.1 to 1.4 and on the complaints in ground 3 about the balancing of interests, and disposed of the remaining complaints, and the whole of the cross-appeal, under Article 81(1) of the Judiciary (Organisation) Act (paras 3.4 and 4).

On the existence of a duty to contract, it held:

The court of appeal rightly took as its starting point that banks, by reason of their position in society, may be under an obligation to offer a payment account also to non-consumers (compare, for consumers, Article 4:71f Wft). It also rightly attached great weight to the fact that without a payment account it is virtually impossible to take part in society and to run a business.

Sub-grounds 1.1 to 1.3, arguing that the duty of care can never lead to a duty to contract, that legal persons do not enjoy the same protection, and that only abuse of rights or unacceptability could justify such a duty, therefore failed. The Court did not adopt in terms the Advocate General’s view that ordinary due care suffices. It confirmed the conclusion, not every step of the reasoning.

On the regulatory side, the Court rejected sub-ground 1.4 and ground 3:

The court of appeal did not fail to recognise that banks may have a legitimate interest in refusing clients on account of supervisory requirements or integrity risks, and that this interest may stand in the way of obliging a bank to offer a payment account. The court of appeal examined ING’s interest in this respect and weighed it against the interest of Yin Yang c.s. It concluded that there is a disproportion between those interests, and that in the circumstances of this case ING’s interest does not stand in the way of an obligation to offer a payment account […], but does stand in the way of an obligation to facilitate the deposit of cash.

That judgment was neither incomprehensible nor insufficiently reasoned. ING was ordered to pay the costs of the principal appeal (€902.34 in disbursements and €2,200 in fees); the group was ordered to pay the costs of the cross-appeal (€68.07 and €2,200, with statutory interest if not paid within fourteen days).

Three points stand out. First, the duty is framed as a duty to offer a payment account, not to provide every banking service: the line between a plain account and cash facilities was decisive. Second, the bank’s regulatory interest is part of the balancing exercise, not a trump card. Third, the ex nunc approach of the court of appeal survived, but ground 2, which attacked it, fell under Article 81(1). The Supreme Court therefore gave no reasoned ruling on the moment of assessment; the reasoned analysis is the Advocate General’s.

ABN AMRO and the Upperbrook fund manager (Amsterdam, 28 April 2026)

Facts

The appellants were three related clients of ABN AMRO: a fund management company founded in 2006 and a client since 2009 ([appellant 1]); a company in the same group, a client since 2004, that provides management services to it ([appellant 2]); and the managing director of [appellant 1], who came to the Netherlands at 18 to study at Nijenrode and had banked with ABN AMRO since 1988 ([appellant 3]). The director’s father is the ultimate beneficial owner of [appellant 1] through a company in the United Arab Emirates and of [appellant 2] through a company in Curaçao (paras 3.1–3.3).

Around 2007 three Libyan state investment companies invested about US$700 million of public money in three funds, now the Cayman Islands Upperbrook funds, with [appellant 1] as manager at an annual fee of 2.5% of assets. The director is the son-in-law of a then prominent Libyan politician. After the regime fell in 2011 the UN imposed sanctions covering the funds, under which the money must be preserved for the Libyan people while the political situation remains unclear. Management runs through accounts at, among others, Deutsche Bank as custodian, which applies restrictions, and in practice through a Dutch foundation with an independent board. The funds are now worth over US$1 billion (paras 3.4–3.9).

The bank began asking questions in August 2011; a Dutch criminal investigation opened in 2012 did not lead to prosecution. After several announcements that it would end the relationship, the bank imposed restrictions on 12 May 2022: payments only with certain entities, a cap of US$3 million a year in and out across [appellant 1]’s two accounts and €250,000 for [appellant 2]. These conditions were breached a few times: more money came in than allowed and payments were made with other entities. By letters of 28 October 2024 the bank terminated all three relationships, citing insufficient cooperation with customer due diligence, integrity risk (mainly breach of the 2022 conditions), sanctions risk and reputational risk, and announced that the appellants would be entered on its internal “CAAML list” (paras 3.10–3.12).

The proceedings

The appellants sought continuation of the relationships, lifting of the 2022 restrictions and a ban on the CAAML listing. The preliminary relief judge of the Amsterdam District Court refused all relief on 13 February 2025 and ordered them to pay costs. They appealed by writ of 12 March 2025 with ten grounds, which the court dealt with together (paras 2.1, 4.1–4.2, 5.1 and 6.2).

The test

The court began by translating Yin Yang into a test for terminations:

The point of departure is that banks, by reason of their position in society, may be under an obligation to offer a payment account also to non-consumers. […] At the same time, a bank may have a legitimate interest in refusing a client on account of supervisory requirements or integrity risks […]. An existing banking relationship may in principle be terminated under Article 35 of the General Banking Conditions, but the client’s interest in keeping a payment account, weighed against the bank’s interest in termination, may in the light of the circumstances stand in the way of that right because termination is unacceptable by standards of reasonableness and fairness.

It stressed that this was the termination of “simple banking relationships” consisting of payment accounts.

The bank’s four grounds, one by one

Source of wealth. The bank doubted the origin of the money in the funds. The court accepted that it could not be excluded that the former rulers acquired wealth illegally or in breach of human rights, but held that for now most of the money could be taken to derive from oil revenue and that, under the UN sanctions, it is Libyan public money to be preserved for the Libyan people. These doubts therefore carried no weight in the balance, all the more since the bank had accepted [appellant 1] as a client in 2009, when it had already managed the funds for some years and the regime was still in power (para. 6.3).

Cooperation with due diligence. The court rejected the appellants’ objection to a review of an existing client: questions about an existing client are in principle permissible, and after the fall of the regime it was understandable that they arose, so the appellants had to answer them (para. 6.4). That matches Article 3(5)(e) Wwft, which the court did not cite. On the evidence, many questions had been asked and answered “relatively extensively”. The court set out the structure: the UBO, the management agreement under which [appellant 1] pays [appellant 2] almost €400,000 a year (€96,000 a quarter), the director’s net salary of €10,000 a month, about 12 staff, three other clients and a current fee of about 1.8% with no performance fee, which the bank had not concretely shown to be out of line with the market (para. 6.5). The international group structure was “not unusual for the Netherlands”; the family had been prominent in Libyan business, but there were no concrete indications that it had acquired its wealth criminally with the regime’s help, and the bank had not responded on substance to the explanation that the family fortune was built from the 1960s on a poultry business. It was therefore unclear on which points the bank was still in the dark, and its claim of insufficient cooperation was “for the time being not plausible” (para. 6.6).

Integrity risk and the 2022 restrictions. The bank relied on breaches of the 12 May 2022 conditions. The court held that contract terms can be changed unilaterally only where the contract expressly provides for it, possibly through general terms for a commercial client; the ABV contain no unilateral power to impose such restrictions, and no consent was shown. The conditions were therefore not binding and could not have been breached (para. 6.7). It added:

As long as there are no concrete indications of irregularities on the account concerned, a bank cannot refuse incoming payments in general terms or impose restrictions in that regard, as happened here. The statutory rules laid down in Title 7B of Book 7 of the Civil Code (payment transactions) do not give it that right.

Reputational and sanctions risk. The fact that the funds were built with public money under the regime did not create a risk where nothing suggested that [appellant 1] managed them improperly, through a custodian applying sanctions restrictions and a foundation with an independent board. The court acknowledged that a substantial fee, combined with the family link to a politician, might raise the question whether the funds were being emptied “under the bank’s eyes”, but it was undisputed that the fee is usual for a hedge-fund manager and may lawfully be paid under the sanctions regime. The allegation of self-enrichment therefore failed (para. 6.8), and there was no concrete danger of sanctions against the bank (para. 6.9). A money-laundering argument first raised at the hearing found no foothold in the facts (para. 6.10).

The client’s interest and the conclusion

Against this stood the client’s interest. The court accepted a point that runs through all these cases:

It appears plausible that, once a bank – after review by a court – has been permitted to end its relationship with a client on account of alleged integrity, sanctions and reputational risks in which money laundering and the violation of human rights were invoked, it becomes very difficult, if not impossible, for the client to find another bank still willing to deal with it. The Bank has not convincingly dispelled that assumption.

Its conclusion turned expressly on the Wwft:

It has not been sufficiently shown that the Bank was obliged under the Wwft to end the relationship because of insufficient cooperation by [appellant 1] with the customer due diligence, or that there are otherwise sufficiently cogent grounds for doing so.

Termination was therefore provisionally held unacceptable. The same applied, for the same reasons, to [appellant 2] and the director (para. 6.13). The court set aside the first-instance judgment, ordered the bank to continue its services, ordered it to lift the 2022 restrictions for lack of any statutory or contractual power, and prohibited the CAAML listing (paras 6.14 and 7.2–7.4). The bank was ordered to pay costs at both instances, set at €1,891 for first instance and, in the operative part, €3,526.00 for the appeal (para. 6.15 itemises €3,526.40), with statutory interest, and to repay what the appellants had paid under the first-instance costs order. The orders were declared provisionally enforceable (paras 7.5–7.7).

Andersson Capital Holding v ING (Amsterdam, 11 November 2025): where the exit holds

The contrast case shows the other side of the line. Andersson, which provides aircraft maintenance and logistics services in the Asia-Pacific region, had banked with ING since December 2020 under the ABV 2017 (paras 3.1–3.2). On 24 June 2024 the Council adopted Decision (CFSP) 2024/1738, aimed among other things at preventing circumvention of Russia sanctions via China (para. 3.4). In July 2024 Andersson sold landing gear for US$6,600,000 to Drayton Aerospace in Xiamen and an aircraft engine for US$2,200,000 to Drayton in Hong Kong. On 25 July 2024 ING received payments of US$500,000 and US$6,600,000 but did not credit them. It released the larger amount on 10 August 2024 but kept asking for the end-user certificate for the engine (paras 3.5–3.9).

Andersson first said that Drayton, not an airline, was the end user and that it could provide nothing further. Just before the summary hearing on 12 August 2024 it produced a certificate naming Lion Air in Indonesia. ING pointed out that this contradicted the earlier statement, was dated 6 August 2024 although the engine was sold in July, referred to a Boeing 737 while the engine was for an Airbus A320, and that Lion Air does not fly Airbus aircraft (para. 3.11). The preliminary relief judge refused to order release on 14 August 2024 (para. 4.2). ING then told Andersson it had to assume the document had been altered, could not exclude sanctions circumvention, and saw risks that it could not meet its Wft and Wwft obligations (para. 3.12). It terminated the relationships with Andersson, two subsidiaries and the director as of 12 February 2025, entered Andersson’s data in its internal and the external referral registers (IVR and EVR) from 15 November 2024 for the maximum of eight years, and on 9 December 2024 filed a criminal complaint for (attempted) forgery under Article 225 of the Criminal Code. Andersson has since opened accounts with Rabobank, after the external registration had been made (paras 3.14–3.18 and 6.7).

On appeal Andersson limited its claims to restoring the relationship, deleting the registrations and a provisional finding that ING had breached its duty of care (para. 5.1). The court first refused an increase of claim made at the hearing under the two-conclusions rule and held that claims on behalf of the subsidiaries and the director, who were not parties, could not succeed (paras 6.1–6.2). On the merits it accepted both of ING’s bases:

ING has made it plausible that it was obliged to terminate the banking relationship under Article 5(3) Wwft, since Andersson has not explained the inconsistencies in the end-user certificates.

Andersson had, despite repeated requests, failed to clarify the identity of the end user, the date of the certificate and the aircraft type, and had given contradictory answers on whether the engine was a sanctioned product. ING was also entitled to terminate under Article 35 ABV: a bank is in principle free to do so, and the reliance on reasonableness and fairness rested only on the claim that banking elsewhere was impossible, which was untrue because Andersson banked with Rabobank (para. 6.5). ING had “certainly not acted rashly” and had given Andersson enough opportunity to prevent the termination (para. 6.6). The alleged inability to obtain Rabobank credit was not shown, and there was no sufficient urgency (paras 6.7–6.8).

The court also upheld both registrations. The IVR entry, visible only within the ING group and limited to name, Chamber of Commerce number, postcode and address, was justified by the facts underlying the termination (para. 6.9). For the EVR, which records criminal personal data, the court required a suspicion heavier than reasonable suspicion: the data must be sufficiently established to support a finding of guilt within the meaning of Article 350 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Andersson’s failure to explain how the certificates came about, apparently deleted text and its refusal to provide the underlying correspondence with Drayton met that standard for now (paras 6.11–6.12). A provisional declaration of breach of duty was not available in summary proceedings (para. 6.15, citing ECLI:NL:HR:2023:503). The judgment was upheld and Andersson ordered to pay appeal costs of €8,989 (court fee €6,561 and fees of €2,428), plus post-judgment costs (paras 6.16–6.17 and 7.1–7.3).

How the judgments fit together

One balancing test, two directions

Read together, the cases apply one method. The bank’s freedom of contract is the starting point; it yields only where, on the facts, the client’s interest in a payment account clearly outweighs the bank’s regulatory and integrity interests. The Supreme Court’s para. 3.3 makes the bank’s legitimate interest in refusing clients on supervisory or integrity grounds part of the scales, not something outside them. The 2026 judgment transposes that reasoning from a duty to contract to a limit on the right to terminate, through the standard of unacceptability under reasonableness and fairness (para. 6.1).

The outcome depends on two variables. The first is how concrete the bank’s concern is. In Yin Yang the concern about cash was concrete and undisputed (80% cash, no customer records), so cash facilities could be refused. The concern about a plain account was not, because the criminal case had collapsed and an account without cash is traceable. In the ABN AMRO case every ground was examined and found unsubstantiated, partly because the bank had not engaged with the client’s explanations (paras 6.5–6.6). In Andersson the documentary inconsistencies were specific and unexplained. The second variable is the client’s alternatives. Proof that other banks refuse was central to Yin Yang (para. 3.12) and was accepted as plausible in the ABN AMRO case (para. 6.11); Andersson’s Rabobank account removed the basis of its reasonableness argument (para. 6.5).

Article 5(3) Wwft as a defence

Banks often present the Wwft as leaving them no choice. The cases show that Article 5(3) is a real duty, but one with factual conditions. In Andersson the court accepted that ING was obliged to exit because it could not complete due diligence on a sanctions-sensitive transaction. In the ABN AMRO case the court asked the same question and answered it the other way: the bank had not shown which information was missing (paras 6.6 and 6.12). In Yin Yang the Advocate General read the court of appeal’s order as implying that ING could comply with Article 5 for an account without cash (para. 4.17). The decisive issue is thus whether due diligence under Article 3(2) actually cannot be completed, not whether the client presents a high risk. High risk calls for enhanced measures; inability to complete due diligence calls for exit.

Restrictions short of exit

Yin Yang shows that a partial solution can be what proportionality requires: an account without cash. The 2026 judgment adds a contractual limit on partial solutions imposed by the bank. Unilateral caps and counterparty restrictions need a contractual or statutory basis, and Title 7B of Book 7 of the Civil Code does not allow a bank to refuse incoming payments generally without concrete indications of irregularity (para. 6.7). By contrast, Andersson concerned a specific payment with a specific sanctions concern, where withholding was upheld at first instance (para. 4.2).

The moment of assessment

The cases leave a structural point. Under the Court of Appeal’s 2019 and 2020 judgments, as summarised by the Advocate General, the validity of a termination is judged on the facts at the time of termination, while a claim for a new relationship is judged on the facts at the time of the ruling. The Supreme Court left both approaches standing, but in each case under Article 81(1), without reasons. The ABN AMRO court did not say which moment it applied; it relied on the course of events up to the termination letter and on explanations given in the proceedings, including at the hearing (para. 6.5). Whether a court reviewing a termination may take later developments into account, or whether a client must instead claim a new contract as in Yin Yang, therefore remains open at Supreme Court level.

Open questions

• The threshold for a duty to contract: the Advocate General considered that ordinary due care under Article 6:162(2) Civil Code suffices (para. 4.13); the Supreme Court confirmed the outcome without adopting that formulation.
• Burden of proof: in the 2026 judgment the bank’s failure to specify what remained unclear, and to respond to the client’s account, was decisive. How far a bank must disclose its concerns, within the confidentiality rules of the Wwft, is not addressed.
• Interim nature: all of these decisions are summary judgments in which the court assesses what a court hearing the full case would probably decide. None of the sources shows a full-merits judgment.

What it means in practice

For businesses facing a review or an exit, the judgments point to the following:

• Answer the questions. The 2026 judgment confirms that a bank may review an existing client and that the client must respond (para. 6.4). The client won because it answered “relatively extensively” and the bank could not say what was missing.
• Document source of wealth and source of funds. The successful explanations covered the UBO chain, the management agreement, salaries, staff numbers, fee levels compared with the market and the family’s business history. A clear account of the ownership structure is required by Article 3(2)(b) Wwft; see also our review of UBO register case law.
• Address the specific concern. In Andersson the failure lay in unexplained inconsistencies in one document and a refusal to share the underlying correspondence. Sanctions-sensitive trade needs consistent end-user documentation from the start.
• Reduce the risk itself, not only the paperwork. Yin Yang lost on cash because its measures did not allow the origin of the cash to be traced (AG, para. 5.26). Measures must address the risk the bank has identified.
• Keep evidence of other banks’ refusals. Written refusals were decisive in Yin Yang (Court of Appeal 2020, para. 3.12). An account elsewhere, as in Andersson, largely removes the argument.
• Check the contract before accepting restrictions. Unilateral caps are not binding without a contractual basis (2026, para. 6.7); on the court’s reasoning, express consent would be a different matter.
• Keep the outcome of any criminal investigation. The prosecution’s letter of 8 June 2018 and the dropped case carried great weight in Yin Yang; in the 2026 case the absence of prosecution after the 2012 investigation pointed the same way (para. 6.6).
• Consider the registers. An exit may be accompanied by entries in internal or shared referral registers; Andersson shows the standard applied to the external register and how hard it is to remove an entry in summary proceedings.

For banks, the same cases indicate that an exit is most robust where the file shows concrete, specific unanswered questions, repeated opportunities to answer them, and consideration of a lesser measure such as an account without cash facilities. A general loss of confidence is not enough unless it is objectively justified for the specific service in question (Court of Appeal 2020, para. 3.14). Where Article 5(3) Wwft is invoked, the file should show why due diligence under Article 3 could not be completed, not merely that the client is high-risk, and the bank will need to consider whether a report under Article 16(4)(b) is due.

Status

Yin Yang v ING is final: the Supreme Court dismissed both appeals on 5 November 2021, and the earlier appeal against the Court of Appeal’s judgment of 30 July 2019 had been dismissed on 5 March 2021. The sources do not show any later proceedings on the merits. The 28 April 2026 and 11 November 2025 judgments are summary judgments on appeal; the sources do not show whether an appeal in cassation has been lodged against either. In the sources, the consumer’s right to a basic account is a matter of Article 4:71f Wft, and no corresponding statutory right for business clients appears in the sources. The Wwft provisions are linked to our translation of the text in force from 1 July 2026.

Provisions discussed

• Wwft: Art. 3, Art. 5
• Civil Code, Book 2: Art. 2:5

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How to cite

Case law review by BCA EU, for information. Quotations from the judgments are our translations; only the original texts published by the courts are authoritative. Judgments checked on the official sources on 30 October 2026. This page is not legal or tax advice.