Banking group ING posted net profit of €776m in the previous quarter, despite a €775m out of court settlement to settle a money laundering scandal.

Nevertheless the figure is still down 44% on a year ago, making it the bank’s worst quarter in two years.

At the beginning of September, ING agreed to pay €775m for failing to properly monitor money transfers for potential money laundering. The public prosecution department says between 2010 and 2016, the bank’s clients were effectively able to launder hundreds of millions of euros because ING was not doing its job properly.

‘Not meeting these standards is unacceptable,’ chief executive Ralph Hamer said in a statement on Thursday. ‘It is sincerely regrettable that the investigations identified serious shortcomings in the execution of policies to prevent financial economic crime at ING Netherlands.’

The bank’s Q3 turnover rose 5% as the bank’s primary client base expanded by 200,000 to 12.2 million. Net core lending grew by €6.8bn.