BFCSA Blog

During the coming weeks, my tireless team of bloggers will re-blog some of the previous classics, lest we all forget.   On 8th August (2pm) I gave evidence in the Federal Senate Inquiry into Banking - Post GFC.   One of the issues raised with the Senators was concerns that we have many people living in their homes for years and paying no payments and we suspected under reporting of defaults to APRA.  We had concerns, and still have that domestic loans were being re-jigged as business loans to enable banks (attempted) to avoid responsibility to their customers.  Classifications of these mortgages has become a sticking point with the Financial Ombudsman's Service ("FOS"). Australian Prudential Regulator Authority ("APRA), sister regulator to useless ASIC on the Twin Peaks System, upon hearing my evidence wrote letters to all major banks and lenders.  It took 14 days from the 8th of August, to pen the letters.  We were never privy to the responses.  APRA...

Inquiry into THE POST – GFC BANKING SECTOR Submission 105 I note that many of the submissions already made to the inquiry deal with complaints about the behaviour and conduct of insolvency practitioners, and lawyers involved in enforcement action by secured creditors.  Some history of my involvement in insolvency and commercial litigation I have nearly 20 years experience dealing in the matters relevant to the terms of reference. Agtion became involved in the specialist consultancy discipline of a forensic analyst dealing in principally banking and insolvency matters as a result of it, and its associated companies being forced into so called “voluntary receivership” by a major bank in 1996.  The companies and I commenced litigation after the companies were released from receivership in 1999. The legal battle against the bank continued until it was resolved in 2007. I am experienced in litigation mainly due to my need to appear and represent...

0 0 0 by Stephen Lendman   At issue is a bad barrel, not a few rotten apples. Western banking is rife with fraud.   The business model of major banks is grand theft.   UK-based Barclays bank was caught in a Libor rigging scandal. Other major banks are involved.  Barclays reflects a corrupt system. Other major banks operate the same way. Western politicians permit it. "They uphold the doctrine that whatever banks do is right."   They're failing. They're zombie banks. The entire system is corrupt. It's crumbling. Barlays is in the center of the UK storm, but watch out. Expect more globally, much more. It's coming.   The seriousness of what's known is that a system portrayed as just and sound is failing. At issue is rampant speculation at the expense of stimulating real economic growth.  Casino capitalism doesn't work. Economies suffer. So do ordinary people. The entire banking...

0 0 0 0 0 0 The Human Race Film – a MATT NORMAN film Breaking News – High Court sets precedent against fraudulent banks 24 Jun 2010 High Court rules against financier of low-doc loans Message from Matt Norman; Before I let you read another great article by Anthony Klan, I just wanted to add my own thoughts on this outstanding result. This news comes just in time for my own high court application on the same grounds as below. The Supreme Court “MELBOURNE” are going to finally look at the professional misconduct of all cases against the banks they have deliberately turned away when they see the thousands of people who have all been led by the banks and the courts into losing homes, suicide, family breakups, bankruptsy because they are not allowing self litigants the chance to have their case heard. I also would like to say...

0 0 0 Extracts from : Submission to the SENATE ECONOMICS REFERENCES COMMITTEE INQUIRY INTO THE POST-GFC BANKING SECTOR Milind Sathye,  Professor of Banking and Finance, University of Canberra.   May 2012    The impact of international regulatory changes on the Australian banking sector,   Impact on Mortgage loans: Securitisation provided a major source of funding for mortgage loans. Under Basel III, there is enhanced risk weight for securitisation instruments. It means the risk position of a bank as depicted in the balance sheet doesn’t capture the changing reality and by the time the regulators, shareholders and investors know the reality it might be too late. A recent case of J P Morgan incurring a loss of $2 billion because of ‘error’ by the chief investment office is a pointer to the grim reality how fortunes of even mighty institutions can change overnight.   External regulation that can’t keep pace with these...

SUBMISSION TO SENATE INQUIRY Sub. 29.    May 2012 Dear Senators, Please find attached my submission that relates to how my business was treated by Bankwest. My business was a family business in the small country town of Forbes in NSW. It was created by my grandfather in 1913, which would of made it 100 years old next year. We were a Painting Contracting company. In 1999 we won a contract to maintain a lot of public schools in western NSW. This was the break we had worked hard for. Within 5 years we went from 5 workers to about 70 workers. This enabled us to tender for other contracts in other areas and in the 5 year period we worked across NSW for such companies as NRMA,TARGET and TRANSFIELD and as well as painting we also started to do building maintenance and insurance works. Life was good.   We were with...

0 0 0 Hold Corrupt Bankers Accountable for Fraud   BY OLIMPIA LEE   Target: European Parliament   Goal :  Hold corrupt bankers accountable for their fraudulent actions   Big banks have been caught rigging global interest rates and ripping millions of people off, but they still have not been held responsible. Now, the EU finance regulator is standing up to big banks and taking action to bring much-needed reform. Urge the EU to stand up to the powerful bank lobby and hold corrupt bankers accountable.   It is public knowledge that big banks such as Barclays have tweaked global interest rates to receive more money from people paying their mortgages, student loans and other debts. This behavior should be punishable by jail, but Barclays only got fined a small fraction of its profits due to the powerful bank lobby. Considering the waves of banking crises that continue to affect our economies and livelihoods, a...

Gold Coast Bulletin. 22/9/2012. New York. Victims of Bernie Madoff's massive PONZI scam will soon receive $2.39 BILLION DOLLARS to help them cover their losses.  Cheques ranging up to $507 million have been mailed to 1230 former customers of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities. The payout, the second of its kind, tripling the amount recovered, brings the total to $3.49 BILLION DOLLARS. Madoff is serving a 150 year jail sentence at a North Carolina JAIL.  He ripped people off for nearly $63 BILLION DOLLARS from clients over decades, paying out fake "profits" to some investors by plundering the new cash from others, before the fraud collapsed in 2008.   AUSTRALIAN BANK EXECUTIVES SHOULD BE NEXT IN LINE.  ...

0 0 0 Sub. 23   Our Submission to the Senate Inquiry “Effects of the GFC on the Australian Banking Sector” Economics References Committee P.O. Box 6110 Parliament House Canberra ACT 2600 23/05/2012   Dear Senators, Before you read this letter, my family & I would like to Thankyou for taking the time to read about our harrowing & disconcerting experience with Commonwealth Bank / Bankwest This is our story - my name is David Crisp & my wife of 46 years is Margaret. I am 67 years of age and I am writing to you because we have had our whole life savings taken by the banking systems of the ‘Commonwealth Bank / Bankwest.   My wife & I have been in business since the age of 21. We have been happily married for 46 years and we have raised 4 wonderful sons. One son works for an airline; the other...

0 0 0 0 0 0 These excerpts are taken from a Submission to Parliamentary Inquiry.  28 April, 2012 Senate Standing Committees on Economics PO Box 6100 Parliament House Canberra ACT 2600     Dear Sir I Madam, I wish to make a submission within the terms of reference above; regarding an incomplete and misleading valuation of a property, commissioned by the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, which was subsequently purchased under mortgage to the CBA. I am now trying to sell the property, and it is worth nothing like its valuation. This has caused me to be unable to discharge the mortgage, for which the CBA is now rejecting any form of responsibility.   Consequently, the valuation over-estimated the value of the property and provided a misleading basis for decision making regarding {a) the merits of purchasing at all, and (b) at the specific price that could be regarded as reasonable...

"A Royal Commission into the Australian Banking Sector is our democratic right. To deny us that right is truly unAustralian."   There are many strong arguments in favour of holding a Royal Commission into Banking with wide terms of reference.  One of the side effect of the Royal Commission is its capacity to bring the issues into every Australian home through the main stream media. This in turn will generate far greater awareness of the serious anomalies and inherent risks within the Australian Financial Sector. It may also answer the questions for so many Australians whose lives have been smashed by the deregulated "free market" Australian Financial Sector, directly and indirectly, including the big ones: Why weren't we told? How could this be allowed to happen in Australia? Consumer protection isn't for just for the elderly - it benefits all Australians. We've been badly misled by those entrusted to protect us,...

I was reading this article (link below at end) & was particularly concerned/apalled at one paragraph: "Variant says the Reserve Bank will come to the rescue of the big four Australian banks in a crisis because they are too important to fail." Is this why our banks treat us plebs (aka 'customers') with so much disdain & utter arrogance? The same attitude they displayed/presented/portrayed to the recent Senate Inquiry & those preceding inquiries? They believe they are too big too fail therefore they are above ALL laws in this unlucky country of ours? The next paragraph is quoting an Australian Analyst's perspective. I think she is caught up in the banks' hype & has not got a good grip on what is occurring in her own backyard so to speak. Then in her final paragraph this statement is made: "She noted that Australian banks were extremely profitable and now far less...

29 August, 2012 BankWest customers tell the Senate shocking stories of fraudulent foreclosures while Australia’s financial journalists are out to lunch — dining on the Commonwealth’s Bank’s record profits. Associate Professor Evan Jones reports. ON THURSDAY 16 August, the Sydney Morning Herald reported the Commonwealth Bank’s approximately $7.1 billion profit, up $700 million from 2010-11. The Herald’s financial journalists fell over themselves in adulation. Here was a true national champion. The previous week, a different story was being played out. The Senate Inquiry into the ‘post-GFC banking sector’ held hearings in Canberra (8th) and Sydney (9th & 10th). A couple of dozen spectators attended the Sydney hearings; it appears that the Herald was not amongst them. It was a spectacle. Transcripts of the hearings are available here. The Senate Economics Committee instigated its banking inquiry in March, following pressure from myriad former customers of CBA-owned BankWest who claim that their...

This is simply brilliant! - a "creative" solution to bank angst - in particular, NAB angst. Bankslayer has done it again :)   This is my how to for creative visualization - I imagine the building is the headquarters of the National Australia Bank being demolished after they've gone bankrupt. How did the nab go bankrupt? Well, after months of campaigning politicians finally did the right thing and there was a Royal Commission into Bank Malpractice. Following even more months of evidence including that of victims of the bank such as Ozzie Inak and Rosie Cornell as well as numerous expert witnesses the nab was stripped of it's license to trade as a bank. Unable to be a fully functioning bank their shareholders abandoned them.  After considerable whingeing the nab was declared bankrupt. See how easy creative visualization is? Help me out - if you're an Aussie demand your Federal MP...

By Larry Schlesinger  Monday, 20 August 2012 http://www.propertyobserver.com.au/mortgages/banks-negligent-and-reckless-with-low-doc-loans-denise-brailey-in-senate-testimony   Most of the low-doc loans banks provided to borrowers would have been rejected if they had made a "simple phone call to the borrowers”, banking consumer advocate Denise Brailey has testified before a Senate inquiry into behaviour of the banking sector post-GFC. But she says banks chose “in a corporate decision” not to make this phone call to ascertain the true financial circumstances of the borrower. Brailey, who runs the Banking and Consumers Finance Support Association (BCFSA), brought with her to the inquiry a “small bundle” of 4,000 “falsified loan applications", which she said includes applications to every bank in Australia. “The four majors are in there. “They are all responsible, through a series of emails from banks to brokers, instructing the brokers how to get their deals across the line — 'make the deal fit' was their usual interpretation." Brailey’s views...

From The Sydney Morning Herald. 8/8/2012   Senators to gauge post-GFC impact on banks A three-day Senate inquiry into the nation's banking system kicks off in Canberra on Wednesday with a focus on developments since the 2008-2009 global financial crisis (GFC).   Witnesses will be quizzed on a range of topics, including the impact of international regulatory changes on Australian banks since the GFC, the cost of funds for institutions, the relative share of specific banking markets, and borrowing and lending practices.   The Department of Treasury and the Australian Bankers' Association will be the first of more than 20 organisations to face the Senate Economics References Committee.   Hearings in Sydney on Thursday and Friday will take evidence from the four major retail banks and the Reserve Bank.   Committee chair, Liberal senator David Bushby, said there had been a lot of focus on the banks' cost of funds as...

"I want what they're having!"   THE ANZ Bank will spend up to $800,000 on a luxury staff trip next year despite having the lowest customer satisfaction rate of all the major banks. The bank will send 75 of its top-performing staff on the trip to reward them for up-selling credit cards and insurance products and meeting other sales targets. The ANZ is yet to finalise details of the trip, but at about $10,000 a head, it will be a holiday to remember.   The bank's budget could stretch to a 10-day trip to Botswana with a sunset cocktail cruise on the Zambezi River, including a private lecture with a professional photographer on how to take the best snaps of elephants in the wild. Or the bank's best performers could be sent on a luxury yacht cruise around the Galapagos Islands, off the coast of South America, where pampered guests...