Tag: Banking

Tax, Law, Crime and Morality in Banking

More holes than in a Swiss Cheese!

There is currently a merry old ding-dong spat going on between the German and Swiss governments. Basically, someone has got hold of information about German citizens with bank accounts in Switzerland where they are hiding large sums on which they should pay German taxes.

This or these enterprising whistleblower(s) are offering to sell this data to the German government for a hefty fee. The German government is on the point of accepting to buy this “illegally-obtained” information from the (from the Swiss point of view) criminals who have stolen their secret bank data.

This story raises a large number of fascinating questions. It has long been common knowledge that Switzerland offers banking facilities with few questions asked. Any self-respecting criminal or tax evader has or had a secret, numbered Swiss account.

What has always amazed me is how they have got away with this for so long, stuck as they are in the centre of Europe. How is it possible that other countries have allowed Switzerland to become a haven for money obtained illegally in other countries?

For it is clearly immoral to profit from the illegal activities of foreign nationals, isn’t it? What exactly is the difference between this behaviour and “receiving stolen goods”? Worse, we have to remember that the largest sums come from drugs. Anyone willing to look after (or launder) drug  money is complicit in the misery and deaths of millions of drug addicts worldwide. Yet the Swiss have pulled off this trick for decades. The Swiss banking (and government) fraternity has never shied away from shady dealings, being until the end of WWII covert supporters of the Nazis.

Well, Angela Merkel is going to do a deal with presumably Swiss “criminals” (according to the Swiss government) in order to recoup money it is owed by German criminals (according to Germany). What a merry old moral maze we have here. But in truth, the world is now too small and inter-connected to allow either tax evasion on a vast scale  or the safeguarding of criminal funds.

Switzerland has to decide whether to remain as a supporter of tax evaders and gangsters (including of course African Presidents who have ripped their countries off in a big way) OR to join the real, civil, honest and inter-connected world.

The rest of us should stop tolerating this connivance with crime. “Client secrecy” is no excuse for condoning and profiting from crime.

More on the whole  Nazi gold in Switzerland story is here.

By Chris Snuggs

Fractional Reserves of the U.S. Banking System Explained

What are Fractional Reserves?

The US Federal Reserve, or Central Bank, is the banking system’s bank. It is the lender of last resort.

It is through the Central Bank that banks settle their accounts with each other. The central bank serves as a clearinghouse for checks written by depositors, and it holds the commercial banks’ reserves.

Bank reserves (vault cash, and deposits by banks at the Central Bank or the Fed) are monies held out of circulation by banks to satisfy the Fed’s reserve requirements and the currency demand by the public. Excess reserves are those held above the legal reserve requirements to handle uncertain demand.  Bank deposits not held in (required plus excess) reserves are used to make loans and earn interest.

When banks make loans, they do not actually lend out the equivalent in cash but instead create on their balance sheet a loan asset and an equal liability called a demand deposit.  Such lending by banks is limited only by reserve requirements (set by the Fed) and the cash they need to satisfy cash withdrawal demand by their customers.

As these loans are then re-deposited by the borrower, the multiplier process continues as fractional reserves are held back and the balance is “lent” out again.

By Sherry Jarrell

Commercial Real Estate and the U.S. Financial System

This is not over yet, folks

The U.S. banking system remains vulnerable to sizeable potential losses as the housing market struggles to recover.

Estimates of these losses range from $500 billion to $1 trillion (£312 bn – £625 bn). The Federal Reserve Board is especially concerned about the impact of commercial real estate on many regional and small banks across the country.  Occupancy and rental rates continue to decline dramatically as 2009 draws to a close, and the worst seems yet to come.

Commercial real estate loans on banks’ balance sheets total almost $1.1 trillion dollars.  With near-term commercial real estate losses topping $100 billion, the Wall Street Journal estimates that as many as one-third of small and mid-size U.S. banks could experience financial distress.



Troubled banks restrict lending until they can raise more capital.  In this illiquid market, expect banks to fight for survival by raising lending rates, shortening maturities, and lowering loan amounts.  Credit will continue to shrink in the U.S., which spells big trouble for any economic recovery.

By Sherry Jarrell