Failing world banks prepare to steal your savings

Press TV – by Brett Redmayne-Titley

Your bank has almost zero cash.

“I’m sorry, Sir. We are unable to cash this check,” were the ominous words delivered to me by a fresh faced, none-too-friendly, Wells Fargo Bank manager. He had just kept me waiting ten minutes while in consultation about my transaction. Returning to his cubicle he sat down quickly, now looking at me intently through narrowed eyes.  

Three feet away, between us and in front of him, were three forms of my personal identification face up. He gazed down glowering at two checks also before him, written to me by a client and drawn on his bank. Not being a “Well’s” customer I expected a shake-down, hence the multiple forms of ID.

The two checks totaled a seemingly paltry sum of almost US$8,000.00. Not expecting this much difficulty I insisted on a reason, to which he replied, “I’m sorry, but the bank does not have sufficient funds on-hand to cash these checks.”

Really? Naturally, like the majority of capitalist indoctrinated bank depositors, I assumed that, as is traditional with banks, this one would have lots of cash. Au Contraire.

Unapologetically he informed me that he was “sorry” but he could only cash one of the checks at this time. Both checks were for about the same amount. I inquired if this was a new bank policy and was told that the bank simply did not have enough cash, and, “no”, I could not come back at the end of the day after the bank had received the days cash deposits. However, if I went to a larger branch they might be able to handle both checks.

This rather unique news seemed worth delving into further, so I declined his kind offer and left with my two onerous withdrawals.

Since I was away from home I decided to wait and stop by my town’s main Wells Fargo branch office.  For anyone following the factual and very dire condition of the world’s economy and its banks, and their growing list of financial crimes against humanity, my sojourn into the realm of Kafka would be amusing but cautionary venture.

Those evil banks. The shadowy Zionist denizens of New York, London, and Brussels are guilty of a staggering set of every-expanding frauds couched in the beneficent language of greedy short term materialistic personal gain. Financial “crimes of the decade,” like the Savings and Loan meltdown, the Enron Collapse, and charlatans like Bernie Madoff are nowadays reported regularly. With financial justice, much less criminal prosecution, no longer a possibility for these criminals, their new and much broader banking crimes now shovel trillions, not billions, into off-shore, non-tax paying accounts of the huber-rich. Thanks to the nature of greed, for them there is never enough.

LIBOR, FOREX, COMEX, and high speed program stock trading, are examples of recent bank frauds have rigged the financial system. No one with a financial choice and better than a fifth grade education would put a penny into the major stock markets. The criminals also have a fraudulent fix for eliminating financial options to one.

By using worthless derivative certificate gold (not bullion) to fraudulently drive down the price of gold and silver, and thanks to the economic trickery that is Quantitative Easing, the bond market and personal savings accounts also produce a very low rate of return. This inflates the currently surging world stock markets by stuffing it full of liquidity that has no other place to go.

Except down.

The banks know the next crash is coming. Like 2007, they caused it. Predator banks know that most people, thanks to financial control of media, are “stupid,” especially regarding the nuances of financial fraud. As the majority of Americans and Europeans live in the illusion that their financial institutions will protect their savings, they miss their bank’s greedy preparations for the next stock market crash slithering through the halls of their parliaments or congress. Legislation that states in plain English, and the language of endemic corruption, that your bank intends to steal your money from your savings account. Your government will let them do this to you. They already have.

Title II of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act provides the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) with new powers and methods to guarantee derivatives once they plummet as did AIG in 2007-09. The bank’s paid-for politicians made sure congress did not regulate derivatives, and thereby encouraged increased financial betting. Thanks to Dodd- Frank and it’s advanced copy, the 2005 Bankruptcy Act, congress made sure these fraudulent bets on stock market manipulation would be mandated to be legally paid back to the banks. This time by the bank’s savings deposits. Yours.

All Americans should recall the “bail-outs” of 2007-9 and how their Zionist controlled Federal Reserve Bank and a Zionist owned US congress very complicatedly threw several trillions of US taxpayer dollars at US banks, dozens of foreign banks, and any corporation with  enough political pull to be defined as “Too Big To Fail” (TBTF). Hence, the banks understand that Americans and Europeans have lost enthusiasm for any future government bail-out of any institution that should normally enjoy the fruits of their crimes via the terminal sentence of bankruptcy.

So, the banksters are preparing to redefine their criminality with two new phases.

“Too Big to Fail,” (TBTF) has a very fraudulent and elitist connotation just like, “bail-out.” To millions across the world who have lost their homes, pension funds, retirement plans, and dreams these barely seven year-old justifications for financial oppression have now been conveniently re-branded.

With this in mind I entered the main branch of Wells Fargo. Two checks in hand, I asked for a manager. On the way in I was greeted warmly, one after the other, by three more fresh faced and eager proteges, all smartly uniformed in Well’s décor, who proffered, “Good morning, Sir,” again, and again, and again. Certainly these small fish were not in possession of authority enough to cash my mammoth check, so I asked for bigger game, the Branch Manager.

I explained my plight to a very lovely lass who predicted she, “would be glad to help me.”
“Cheryl,” patiently explained that I had come to the right place and she would be glad to cash both checks. Regarding my previous polite banking experience, she admitted that it was indeed bank policy to have limits on cash withdrawals, and that different branches had different limits. This was a main branch so my request here was meritorious. Further, she admitted that whatever daily cash coming into the branches in the form of deposits was not available for withdrawal, but was sent from the branch for daily accounting at a central point common to all area bank branches.

Oh, dear.

“A couple of times your current request,” was her cautious response to may question about her branch’s limits on check cashing. Not to be put-off I asked about a hypothetical US$25,000 check, which she admitted this was beyond her branches authority. “But,” she smiled, “You’ve come to the right place.”

TBTF and bailed-out banks have now created much more ominous replacement definitions of fraud. TBTFs are now all-important, “Globally Active, Systemically Important, Financial Institutions” (G-SIFI). That sounds so much better. Certainly more pleasingly self-important.

“Bail-outs,” may have also lost their meaning but the next one is just a “Bail-In,” away.

Bail-ins, the new “systemically” correct term for public financed bank fraud, are already named in national policies and laws, appearing in multiple countries. These finance laws, such as Dodd-Frank and its pending European Union version, make legal and allows for failing G-SIFI banks to legally convert the funds of “unsecured creditors” into capital. Those creditors include “secured” creditors, state and local government funds, and ordinary bank depositors, just like you!

Oh, dear.

The financial law firm Davis Polk estimates the final length of Dodd-Frank, the single longest bill ever passed by the US government, is 30,000 pages.  The six largest banks in the US spent $29.4 million lobbying Congress in 2010, and flooded Capitol Hill with about 3,000 lobbyists prior to Obama predictably signing its final version.  No US congressman or senator has read it. But the bank’s congressional minions were told to vote for it. And dutifully they did.

The major cause of the upcoming financial meltdown, as with the pre-2008 conditions, is globally systemic gambling against national economies; derivatives. Derivatives are sold as a kind of betting insurance for managing fraudulent banking profits and risk. So why fix systemic banking fraud that made so much money for the same banks in the first recession?

Thanks to Dodd- Frank derivatives suddenly have “super-priority” status in bankruptcy. The Bank for International Settlements quoted global OTC derivatives at $632 trillion as of December 2012. Naked Capitalism states that $230 trillion in worthless derivatives are on the books of US banks. That means that bad bank bets on derivatives will be paid-off first before you get your savings cash. If there’s actually any cash left once you get to the counter.

Normally in a capital liquidation structure, bond holders are supposed to be wiped out before deposits are touched. Under these new “bail-in” mandates, the governments have reordered your bank’s exposure, making derivatives and other high risk ventures more highly protected than bank depositor’s savings. In the recent example of Cyprus, Germany and the ECB made depositors inferior to other bank holdings.

Supposedly, using the language of Dodd- Frank, banks will not be given taxpayer bailouts.

The preamble to the Dodd-Frank Act claims “to protect the American taxpayer by ending bailouts.” But how to bail-in the G-SIFI without a tax payer bail-out? No problem.

Future bail-outs are prevented, however, through approval of new bail-ins, a critical feature of the internationally established regime of what is called cross-border bank resolution.

Enter the FDIC, the US agency required to pay back depositors who lose savings up to $250,000. Armed with a paltry US$25 billion compared to an estimated total US cash deposits of US$7.36 trillion, once the banks steal your savings under Dodd-Frank, FDIC, which is charged with aiding the banks in seizing your funds, will next have to replace them. With, of course, more of your money.

Oh, dear. 

TWO GREEDY CHOICES-

Regarding the FDIC’s new authority, conservative US congressman Ron Paul warned, “It’s [FDIC] already indicated that they will confiscate [savings] funds…”.
On December 10, 2012, a joint strategy paper was drafted by the Bank of England (BOE) and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) titled, “Resolving Globally Active, Systemically Important, Financial Institutions.” Here the plot to steal depositor savings is clearly laid out.

The report’s “Executive Summary” states,

“… the authorities in the United States (US) and the United Kingdom (UK) have been working together to develop resolution strategies…These strategies have been designed to enable [financial institutions] to be resolved without threatening financial stability and without putting public funds at risk.”

Sounds good until you read the fine print.

While protecting taxpayers, Title II of Dodd- Frank gives the FDIC an enforcement arm, the Orderly Liquidation Authority (OLA) which is similar to its British counterpart the Prudent Regulation Authority (PRA). Both already have the authority to punish depositors of failing institutions by arbitrarily making their savings subordinated to bank claims for the replacement value their derivatives. Before Dodd-Frank savings deposits were legally senior to these claims.

With the banks holding only $7 trillion in personal savings deposits compared to $230 trillion is US derivative obligations, FDIC’s $25 billion will be just a bit short. The creators of Dodd-Frank knew this before it was signed. As John Butler points out in an April 4th article in Financial Sense, “Do you see the sleight-of-hand at work here? Under the guise of protecting taxpayers, depositors… are to be arbitrarily, subordinated… when in fact they are legally senior to those claims…Remember, its stated purpose [Dodd-Frank] is to solve the problem… namely the existence of insolvent TBTF institutions that were “highly leveraged with numerous and dispersed financial operations, extensive off-balance-sheet activities, and opaque financial statements.”

Indeed. Fraud.

Bank depositors can rest easy in the knowledge that replacing their savings will not come out of their pockets via another bank bail-out. Congress will instead replace their savings with a $7 trillion bail-in to FDIC to “replace” their savings.

And that’s the good choice.

Worse, any depositor with money in the bank, from $1 to $250,000 (the FDIC limit) and everything above, can be converted to bank stock. FDIC has provisions so this can be done, via OLA, quite literally overnight.

An FDIC report released just a few months ago reads:
“An efficient path for returning the sound operations of the G-SIFI to the private sector would be provided by exchanging or converting a sufficient amount of the unsecured debt from the original creditors of the failed company [meaning the depositors] into equity [or stock].
Additionally, per an April 24, 2012 IMF report, conversion of bank debt to stock is an essential element of bail-ins included in Dodd-Frank. “The contribution of new capital will come from debt conversion and/or issuance of new equity, with an elimination or significant dilution of the pre-bail in shareholders. …Some measures might be necessary to reduce the risk of a ‘death spiral’ in share prices.”

Oh, dear.

To retrieve the value of what was formerly the depositor’s account balance, the stock must be sold. When Lehman Brothers failed, unsecured creditors (depositors are unsecured creditors) got eight cents on the dollar.

A conversion of deposits into equity already had another test-run during the bankruptcy reorganization of Bankia and four other Spanish banks earlier this year. The conditions of a July 2012 Memorandum of Understanding resulted in over 1 million small depositors becoming stockholders in Bankia when they were sold “preferentes” (preferred stock) in exchange for their deposits. Following the conversion, the preferentes were converted into common stock originally valued at EU 2.0 per share, then further devalued to EU 0.1 after the March restructuring of Bankia.

Canada has stated they are planning a similar “bail-in” program. The Canadian government recently released this document titled the Economic Action Plan 2013 which says, “the Government proposes to implement a “bail-in” regime for systemically important banks.”

Don’t be getting cute by hiding your cash, precious metals, or passport in a bank safe deposit box. There are not safe either.

Under Dodd- Frank the FDIC, using the auspices of Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) the can legally, without a warrant, enter the bank vault, have the manager secretly open any safe deposit box, and inventory, or seize the contents. Further, if the manager is honest enough to inform the depositor of the incursion he is subject to criminal charges and termination from bank employ.

Oh, dear.

The commingling strength of the now remaining G-SIFI banks was further evident when, cash finally in hand, I headed to my bank, JP Morgan Chase, right next door.

The manager confirmed that the cash withdrawal policy at Chase was in keeping with that at Wells. Very little cash available on demand. I posed a slight mis-truth and inquired as to what I should do about my upcoming need for $50,000 in cash. No, her bank would not do that on demand, but arrangements could be made to have the cash transferred to her bank. That would only take “about two days.”

So, depositors, your extreme caution is required. The wording of these new bank inspired sets of legislation is silently waiting to be used by many nations to prioritize banks before their citizen’s. When the time comes, the race to the bank will be a short lived event indeed.

You do not want to be second in line.

BRT/MAM

Brett Redmayne-Titley spent his formative years with his family in Queensland, Australia, Ghana, West Africa, and the Bahamas. Visiting over fifty counties over four decades he has seen the world slowly destroyed by greed, capitalism and empire. Not content to watch from the side lines, Brett has taken up his pen to tell the truth about important stories. On-scene reporting is his specialty. Traveling to the story he has written in-depth, multi-part articles about the Keystone XL Pipeline, Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations, the San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant, the 2012 Democratic National Convention, the police killing of Evan Kwik and many more.  His articles have been published by dozens of on-line news services. More articles by Brett Redmayne-Titley.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/06/23/368315/failing-world-banks-to-steal-your-savings/