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Washington takes the pressure to Panama

1 min read

13:24UTC

The US Ambassador to Panama warned Panamanian banks and firms on 13 July over Cuban sanctions evasion, naming Fincimex and BFI as examples of the risk.

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Key takeaway

Washington took its Cuba sanctions warning directly to Panama's banks and their compliance desks.

Kevin Marino Cabrera, the US Ambassador to Panama, and State Deputy Assistant Secretary Samuel Parker warned Panamanian banks and firms on Monday 13 July about the sanctions risk of facilitating Cuban evasion, citing Fincimex, Cuba's remittance processor, and Banco Financiero Internacional (BFI) as examples ¹.

Panama's banking sector and the Colón Free Zone have long provided a re-export and settlement channel for Cuban trade that cannot clear through US-linked correspondent banks. OFAC had designated the bank itself on 23 June . Naming it again to a room of Panamanian bankers does something the designation alone cannot: it puts the compliance officers of institutions outside US jurisdiction on notice that the relationship now carries a documented risk. Banks de-risk on the strength of that notice long before any enforcement action, which is how a designation propagates into markets Washington cannot reach directly.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Kevin Marino Cabrera, the US ambassador to Panama, and Samuel Parker, a State Department deputy assistant secretary, met Panamanian banks and firms on 13 July to warn them against "sanctions evasion" tied to Cuba. This is not a new sanction; it is a warning to third-country banks that doing business with entities already on the US sanctions list carries risk even if the bank itself is Panamanian, not American. The entities they cited as examples, Fincimex, Cubita coffee, BFI and RAFIN, were all sanctioned months or years earlier. The meeting's purpose was to make sure Panama's financial sector understood the exposure, not to announce anything new.

What could happen next?

Consequence
Panamanian banks and firms doing any business with the named entities now have direct, explicit US notice of sanctions-evasion risk, raising the likelihood of de-risking (banks simply refusing Cuba-linked business to avoid exposure).

Sources:CiberCuba

Mentions:Fincimex →Banco Financiero Internacional →Cuba →Washington →OFAC →Panama →

First Reported In

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CiberCuba· 17 Jul 2026

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Causes and effects

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This Event

Washington takes the pressure to Panama

Warning third-country bankers face to face is how a US designation reaches institutions that US jurisdiction cannot bind.

Different Perspectives

China

Foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun called China-Cuba cooperation open, transparent and legitimate on 11 August, after the 6 August designations reached Cuban military attachés posted to China and Russia. The statement named no new assistance.

Russia

The Russian embassy in Havana said on 31 August that expanding BRICS full membership is not on the agenda, declining the upgrade Cuba had sought before the New Delhi summit. Moscow remains Cuba's most reliable outside supplier but stopped short of the diplomatic step Havana wanted.

Dominican Republic

The Dominican Republic ordered nine Cuban diplomats and their families to leave on 13 August without stating a reason, a rupture Havana has not been given an explanation for. Neither government has since clarified what prompted the expulsion.

Observatorio Cubano de Derechos Humanos

OCDH's Madrid-based survey found 94 per cent of Cubans in extreme poverty and 84 per cent distrusting Havana's own reform measures, fieldwork closed three weeks before Decree 325. The group monitors from exile because independent rights monitoring cannot operate legally on the island, and Lowdown could not reach a comparable on-island voice.

Cuban government (Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla)

Rodríguez answered the 3 September designations on Cubadebate the same day without naming any of the five sanctioned entities, calling the wave collective punishment. Havana has used the same anti-blockade framing for each prior wave rather than contesting individual designations.

US Treasury (OFAC) and State Department

OFAC designated Banco Exterior de Cuba and four traders on 3 September; its SDN entry links the individual named alongside them only to Alejandro Castro Espín. The State Department's own announcement, not OFAC's listing, called that individual "a grandson of Raul Castro" and the designated entities exploiters of Cuba's resources "for the benefit of the regime."