Banking Giant HSBC May Leave U.K. Over Taxes, And John Tory Wants It To Come To Toronto

HSBC, the world’s fourth-largest bank by assets, is so fed up with new regulations and a new tax on banks in Britain that it’s looking to leave London for lower-tax pastures.

The bank’s plans are controversial to say the least, with some observers accusing the company of throwing a temper tantrum at Britain for its post-financial crisis banking regulations, while other observers fear for the future of the 50,000 people employed by the bank in the U.K.

The Entitled Get More Brazen by the Day

Every so often a cluster of news stories combine to become more than the simple sum of their parts. In the last few weeks, stories have emerged that reinforce the argument made by some academics and commentators suggesting that the West, including Canada, is beginning to devolve into a kind of new feudalism.

First up the revelations, leaked by an insider, that Swiss banking giant HSBC actively facilitates gross tax evasion on the part of the world's wealthy and also launders billions in drug money.

HSBC files reveal how UK's non-dom tax concession is being exploited

The leaked HSBC Swiss files reveal how widely Britain’s unique “non-dom” tax concession is being exploited.

The government says the controversial tax status is supposed to be to the nation’s benefit, by encouraging wealthy foreign investors to spend time in Britain.

But the account records, previously a closely guarded secret, show that many other types of people have been exploiting its loose terms, and depriving the UK and other countries of tax revenue.

Banking Giant HSBC Sheltered Murky Cash Linked to Dictators and Arms Dealers

Team of journalists from 45 countries unearths secret bank accounts maintained for criminals, traffickers, tax dodgers, politicians and celebrities

Secret documents reveal that global banking giant HSBC profited from doing business with arms dealers who channeled mortar bombs to child soldiers in Africa, bag men for Third World dictators, traffickers in blood diamonds and other international outlaws.

The leaked files, based on the inner workings of HSBC’s Swiss private banking arm, relate to accounts holding more than $100 billion. They provide a rare glimpse inside the super-secret Swiss banking system — one the public has never seen before.

HSBC Accused Of Fraud, Money Laundering, Forming Criminal Organization

BRUSSELS - A Belgian investigating judge has charged a Swiss private banking branch of HSBC with massive organized fiscal fraud, money laundering and forming a criminal organization to the benefit of over 1,000 wealthy clients that cost the Belgian authorities "hundreds of millions of euros."

HSBC To Be Sued By New York Over Foreclosure Abuses

* NY says HSBC ignored law designed to protect homeowners

* Bank declines to comment

NEW YORK, June 4 (Reuters) - The state of New York plans to sue HSBC Holdings Plc for ignoring a law designed to protect struggling homeowners from being thrown into foreclosure without getting a chance to renegotiate their mortgages.

HSBC Bank Canada Outsourcing Finance Jobs To India: Documents

Royal Bank of Canada isn't the only financial institution where employees are busy training their foreign replacements.

Sources close to HSBC Bank Canada told The Huffington Post Canada that the country's seventh-largest bank is preparing to send as many as 23 finance jobs to India as part of an "operational efficiency" program.

Internal documents obtained by The Huffington Post Canada confirm that at least two employees from the bank's Global Resource Centre (GRC) in Gurgaon, India are currently in Vancouver learning their jobs from the people they're replacing, one of them a 20-year veteran, but a source said as many as 23 jobs could be transitioned abroad.

Gangster Bankers: Too Big to Jail

How HSBC hooked up with drug traffickers and terrorists. And got away with it


The deal was announced quietly, just before the holidays, almost like the government was hoping people were too busy hanging stockings by the fireplace to notice. Flooring politicians, lawyers and investigators all over the world, the U.S. Justice Department granted a total walk to executives of the British-based bank HSBC for the largest drug-and-terrorism money-laundering case ever. Yes, they issued a fine – $1.9 billion, or about five weeks' profit – but they didn't extract so much as one dollar or one day in jail from any individual, despite a decade of stupefying abuses.

HSBC Sued By Atlanta-Area Counties Over Predatory Lending Claims

ATLANTA -- Three Atlanta-area counties have filed a lawsuit claiming that British bank HSBC cost them hundreds of millions of dollars in extra expenses and damage to their tax bases by aggressively signing minorities to housing loans that were likely to fail.

The Georgia counties' failure or success with the relatively novel strategy could help determine whether other local governments try to hold big banks accountable for losses in tax revenue based on what they claim are discriminatory or predatory lending practices. Similar lawsuits resulted in settlements this year worth millions of dollars for communities in Maryland and Tennessee.

Outrageous HSBC Settlement Proves the Drug War is a Joke

If you've ever been arrested on a drug charge, if you've ever spent even a day in jail for having a stem of marijuana in your pocket or "drug paraphernalia" in your gym bag, Assistant Attorney General and longtime Bill Clinton pal Lanny Breuer has a message for you: Bite me.

Breuer this week signed off on a settlement deal with the British banking giant HSBC that is the ultimate insult to every ordinary person who's ever had his life altered by a narcotics charge. Despite the fact that HSBC admitted to laundering billions of dollars for Colombian and Mexican drug cartels (among others) and violating a host of important banking laws (from the Bank Secrecy Act to the Trading With the Enemy Act), Breuer and his Justice Department elected not to pursue criminal prosecutions of the bank, opting instead for a "record" financial settlement of $1.9 billion, which as one analyst noted is about five weeks of income for the bank.

Matt Taibbi: After Laundering $800 Million in Drug Money, How Did HSBC Executives Avoid Jail?

The banking giant HSBC has escaped indictment for laundering billions of dollars for Mexican drug cartels and groups linked to al-Qaeda. Despite evidence of wrongdoing, the U.S. Department of Justice has allowed the bank to avoid prosecution and pay a $1.9 billion fine. No top HSBC officials will face charges, either. We’re joined by Rolling Stone Contributing Editor Matt Taibbi, author of "Griftopia: A Story of Bankers, Politicians, and the Most Audacious Power Grab in American History." “You can do real time in jail in America for all kinds of ridiculous offenses,” Taibbi says. “Here we have a bank that laundered $800 million dollars of drug money and they can’t find a way to put anybody in jail for that? That sends an incredible message, not just to the financial sector, but to everybody. It’s an obvious, clear double standard where one set of people gets to break the rules as much as they want and another set of people can’t break any rules at all without going to jail.”

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Source: Democracy Now!
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Obama Administration Essentially Admits That Some Banks Are Too Big To Jail, Which Is Troubling

One of the great things about being too big to fail is that you're also too big to jail, apparently.

So saith the Obama administration, via the New York Times, in its front-page story on Tuesday about HSBC's settlement with the government over money-laundering charges. Though the British banking giant had to pay a wrist-stinging $1.9 billion, the settlement helped it avoid formal criminal charges. The NYT quotes anonymous government officials who say they were skittish about indicting HSBC because formal charges would amount to a "death penalty" for the bank, potentially roiling the financial system.

This is at least three very specific flavors of bullshit.

HSBC To Pay More Than $2 Billion In Penalties

LONDON, July 30 (Reuters) - HSBC's boss said on Monday revelations of lax anti-money laundering controls had been "shameful and embarrassing" for Europe's biggest bank, and may force it to pay out well over $2 billion for those flaws and in compensation for UK mis-selling.

HSBC set aside $700 million to cover fines and other costs for an anti-money laundering scandal, after a U.S. Senate report criticised it this month for letting clients shift funds from dangerous and secretive countries, notably Mexico.

HSBC laundered billions of dollars for Mexican drug cartels, Senate investigation finds

WASHINGTON—Lax controls at Europe’s largest bank, HSBC, allowed Mexican drug cartels to launder billions of dollars through its U.S. operations, a Senate investigation has found.

The extensive report on London-based HSBC Holdings PLC by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations also says U.S. regulators knew the bank had a poor system to detect problems but failed to take action.

David Prosser: Why HSBC should claw back the £3.8m bonus promised to its former chief executive

There are all sorts of reasons why HSBC's mis-selling of long-term care bonds wasserious enough to warrant the largest fine ever levied by the Financial ServicesAuthority on a retail bank, though just one of them says it all. The bank routinely sold savings plans with a five-year investment horizon to elderly customers who did not expect to live for as long as five years.

This is one of those cases where one wonders how City regulators everallowed them to get away with it, soobvious do the transgressions seem. Worse, HSBC might still be getting away with it today as far as the Financial Services Authority is concerned, for it was the bank that brought the problem to the attention of the regulator, rather than vice versa.

The regulator said yesterday that the size of its fine "should serve as a warning to firms". Well, maybe, though £40m (the cost of the penalty plus compensation for those affected) is loose change in the context of the £11.8bn profit that HSBC made during 2010 alone. A more useful deterrent would be regulatory action against some of the individuals concerned.

To start with, what has happened to the financial advisers who used to work for the HSBC subsidiary at the centre of this scandal, NHFA? Since these salesmen and women ruthlessly exploited vulnerable customers over a five-year period, it would be good to know they are now prevented from behaving in similar fashion at another company – the FSA can offer us no reassurance that this is the case. None of them has faced personal disciplinary action.