{"id":14894,"date":"2012-12-14T13:12:19","date_gmt":"2012-12-14T20:12:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=14894"},"modified":"2012-12-14T13:12:19","modified_gmt":"2012-12-14T20:12:19","slug":"drug-money-and-above-the-law-global-banking-cartel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=14894","title":{"rendered":"Drug Money and Above-the-Law Global Banking Cartel"},"content":{"rendered":"

The \u201cInternational Cartel\u201d of Drug Money Banks & Their Political Protectors<\/em><\/p>\n

Banking on Criminality: Drug Money & the Above-the-Law Global Banking Cartel<\/strong>
\n14 December, 2012 – boiling frogs<\/p>\n

In what the New York Times declared as a \u201cdark day for the rule of law\u201d on December 11, 2012, HSBC, the world\u2019s second largest bank, failed to be indicted for extensive criminal activities in laundering money to and from regimes under sanctions, Mexican drug cartels, and terrorist organizations (including al-Qaeda). While admitting culpability, and with guilt assured, state and federal authorities in the United States decided not to indict the bank \u201cover concerns that criminal charges could jeopardize one of the world\u2019s largest banks and ultimately destabilize the global financial system.\u201d Instead, HSBC agreed to pay a $1.92 billion settlement.<\/p>\n

The fear was that an indictment would be a \u201cdeath sentence\u201d for HSBC. The U.S. Justice Department, which was prosecuting the case, was told by the U.S. Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve that taking such an \u201caggressive stance\u201d against HSBC could have negative effects upon the economy. Instead, the bank was to forfeit $1.2 billion and pay $700 million in fines on top of that for violating the Bank Secrecy Act and the Trading with the Enemy Act. In a statement, HSBC\u2019s CEO stated, \u201cWe accept responsibility for our past mistakes\u2026 We are committed to protecting the integrity of the global financial system. To this end, we will continue to work closely with governments and regulators around the world.\u201d With more than $7 billion in Mexican drug cartel money laundered through HSBC alone, the fine amounts to a slap on the wrist, no more than a cost-benefit analysis of doing business: if the \u2018cost\u2019 of laundering billions in drug money is less than the \u2018benefit,\u2019 the policy will continue.<\/p>\n

As part of the settlement, not one banker at HSBC was to be charged in the case. The New York Times acknowledged that, \u201cthe government has bought into the notion that too big to fail is too big to jail.\u201d HSBC joins a list of some of the world\u2019s other largest banks in paying fines for criminal activities, including Credit Suisse, Lloyds, ABN Amro and ING, among others. The U.S. Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer referred to the settlement as an example of HSBC \u201cbeing held accountable for stunning failures of oversight.\u201d Lanny Breuer, who heads the Justice Department\u2019s criminal division, which was responsible for prosecuting the case against HSBC, was previously a partner at a law firm (along with the U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder) where they represented a number of major banks and other conglomerates in cases dealing with foreclosure fraud. While Breuer and Holder were partners at Covington & Burling, the firm represented notable clients such as Bank of America, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo, among others. It seems that at the Justice Department, they continue to have the same job: protecting the major banks from being persecuted for criminal behavior.<\/p>\n

With a great deal of focus on the $1.9 billion in fines being paid out by HSBC, little mention was made of the fact that HSBC had roughly $2.5 trillion in assets, and earned $22 billion in profits in 2011. But not to worry, HSBC\u2019s executive said that they \u201caccept responsibility for our past mistakes,\u201d and added: \u201cWe have said we are profoundly sorry for them, and we do so again.\u201d So not only did the executives of the world\u2019s second largest bank apologize for laundering billions in drug money (along with other crimes), but they apologized\u2026 again. Thus, they pay a comparably small fine and face no criminal charges. I wonder if a crack dealer from a ghetto in the United States could avoid criminal prosecution if he were to apologize not once, but twice. Actually, we don\u2019t have to wonder. In May of 2012, as HSBC executives were testifying before the U.S. Senate in Washington D.C., admitting their role in drug money laundering, a poor black man was convicted of peddling 5.5 grams of crack cocaine just across the river from the U.S. Capitol building, and he was given 10 years in prison. …more<\/a><\/p>\n

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The \u201cInternational Cartel\u201d of Drug Money Banks & Their Political Protectors Banking on Criminality: Drug Money & the Above-the-Law Global Banking Cartel 14 December, 2012 – boiling frogs In what the New York Times declared as a \u201cdark day for the rule of law\u201d on December 11, 2012, HSBC, the world\u2019s second largest bank, failed more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[247],"tags":[3823],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14894"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14894"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14894\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14896,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14894\/revisions\/14896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}