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"Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

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Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#51

Post by maxglute »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #34
maxglute wrote: post #21

>The whistleblower, whomThe Bureau is calling D.M., immigrated to Canada as an international student from India, making him a minority among mostly Chinese-Canadian co-workers at the Aurora branch. I mean it's real Chinese income backed by fake paperwork. There's PRC capital controls, rich PRC national who buy RE abroad are going to do it via laundering services and has been for decade+. Banks are fine with this and…

It could be real Chinese income backed by fake paper work (money laundering) or fake income backed by fake paper work (fraud). You can take out $50k per year, a lot more via exemptions, so you don’t need money laundering to get money out of china into the USA (I had to move a few hundred K before, all the paper work was legit).

I presume you were foreign national with more options. Options for diasphora Chinese, many who illegally hold dual citizenship and relies on PRC nationality to do transactions/capital flight in PRC is different.

I highlighted the original quote where branch is mostly Chinese-Canadian for context. Aurora is 20% Chinese, it's a big diasphora neighbourhood. There isn't some big "fake chinese income" conspiracy, it's the entire (proven) business plan (money laundering) with occasional fraud. I think pretty much everyone knew Chinese are buying million+ propertiers with laundered money, and it fuels the bubble as much as any other foreign buyer.

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#52

Post by thriftwy »

realusername wrote: post #45
user3939382 wrote: post #43

HSBC funneled $1B (that we know about) for cartels, it came out as 100% knowingly committed, and no one went to jail. Basically the government asked for their cut. Why wouldn't do they this again and again? They are above the law, they are the law.

It's HSBC being HSBC, I can't say that I'm surprised. Drug cartels and money laundering are at the core of their brand value.

"The reason we can say space pirates does not exist is that HSBC does not have a subdivision dedicated to catering to such clients"

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#53

Post by kurthr »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #28
Terr_ wrote: post #2

IANAFinancialInvestigator, but skimming through it sounds like: 1. Fraudulent applicants come to the bank with crazy stories to ask for enormous loans/mortgages toward a Toronto house, allegedly to turn hyper-suspicious big piles of cash into a more reputable-looking asset. 2. HSBC goes along with that because they want to suckle on the sweet regular payments of suspicious cash, even though they ought to damn well kn…

A lot of it doesn’t even sound like money laundering, just fraud. You say you have a job paying you lots of money from China, verification is loose, you get the loans, and then try to make mortgage payments via Airbnb. The risk is mostly with the bank, and if it doesn’t blow up you make all the money.

How could you lose money? RE prices only go up... as long as there's a greater fool... oh, wait?!

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#54

Post by opportune »

realusername wrote: post #45
user3939382 wrote: post #43

HSBC funneled $1B (that we know about) for cartels, it came out as 100% knowingly committed, and no one went to jail. Basically the government asked for their cut. Why wouldn't do they this again and again? They are above the law, they are the law.

It's HSBC being HSBC, I can't say that I'm surprised. Drug cartels and money laundering are at the core of their brand value.

Ignorant American here. Isn’t Hong Kong supposed to be the HQ/money exit point for Chinese organized crime? And HSBC is the main bank there, but headquartered in the UK?

If I had to guess they are heavily involved with spooks and foreign assets operating in China (and if so, why not use them for non-Chinese intelligence-financial shenanigans?) and a lot of their “illegal” activity is unofficially blessed by foreign intelligence.

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#55

Post by eswat »

dade_ wrote: post #24

HSBC Canada is in the process of being sold to RBC. As employees will no longer work for HSBC in March and possibly unemployed through the new found efficiencies by RBC, this creates an interesting situation for virtually no risk whistle-blowing. I hadn't thought of this possibility when the exit was announced.

> this creates an interesting situation for virtually no risk whistle-blowing

Not so risk-free unfortunately

> A June 2023 email from the bank’s personnel department says “we hereby demand that you [the whistleblower] immediately and permanently delete any and all HSBC information on any personal email accounts.”

> “If you do not comply with these obligations,” the email warns, “HSBC also reserves the right to bring this matter to the attention of relevant law enforcement agencies.”

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#56

Post by JumpCrisscross »

alchemist1e9 wrote: post #41
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> bizarre any jurisdiction would allow someone to buy housing there when they can't legally live in it Foreign-owned homes are a problem for asset acquirers. Vacant homes are a problem for anyone who needs housing. The former seems to get a lot of visibilty when concerns around the latter get raised.

> Vacant homes are a problem for anyone who needs housing. But they pay taxes without demanding any services and the seller assessed they had better use of the capital, they could buy or build a more suitable home. If I lived in a location with 50% vacant homes all paying property taxes then wouldn’t my schools and streets and all local government services be extremely well funded?

> If I lived in a location with 50% vacant homes all paying property taxes then wouldn’t my schools and streets and all local government services be extremely well funded

If the polity is smart, yes.

It looks like British Columbia gets about 15% of its revenue from property taxes and transfers [1]. So you'd need adjustments to make up for the personal, corporate, sales, fuel, carbon, tobacco and insurance premium (?) revenues the vacant homeowner isn't paying.

[1] https://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/british-columbians-our-gov... Table 2.3

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#57

Post by function_seven »

alchemist1e9 wrote: post #36
stormfather wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something drastic has to be done about the cost of housing if we're to leave a functional society to the next generation.

Blaming foreign investors for a housing crisis is a smokescreen. It's not the demand from investors that's the issue; it's the government's stifling regulations that choke new construction. The mess is because of state failure, not market failure. When sellers freely sell their homes to foreign buyers, they're making choices that benefit them. Why should we deny them that right? The real absurdity is ignoring the ele…

Yup.

The Power of Pricing is a thing that exists whether you want it to or not. Smart policy uses it to great advantage. Dumb policy redirects this to hurt those it intends to help. Rent control, restrictions on production, byzantine zoning and construction rules... all contribute to distorting the market in ways that push back on the original (or at least, stated) intentions.

You want housing to be cheaper? Increase supply. That's it. You don't want foreign investment in your properties? Don't make them so damn attractive as pure investment vehicles. How? Increase supply.

There's always a boogeyman to be blamed when markets are so broken like this.

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#58

Post by mikeyouse »

user3939382 wrote: post #43

HSBC funneled $1B (that we know about) for cartels, it came out as 100% knowingly committed, and no one went to jail. Basically the government asked for their cut. Why wouldn't do they this again and again? They are above the law, they are the law.

"The government asked for their cut" actually means that for laundering that $881 million in cartel money - they were fined $1.9 billion and then had to pay an additional $665 million in other civil penalties.

They wouldn't do it again and again because they don't earn $880 million when accepting $880 million in dirty money - remember that bank deposits are liabilities to the bank - they only earn money from interest on that -- and it cost them billions in fines to do so...

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#59

Post by fakedang »

inSenCite wrote: post #10

HSBC soon to be RBC. This is not very surprising, a lot of this also gets facilitated by the independent mortgage brokers who get ppl through the system with some 'creative coaching'.

Lol no. HSBC has always had a much worse reputation than RBC, or any other bank for that matter. HSBC and Standard Chartered are amongst the worst international offenders when it comes to fraud and money laundering.

Re: "Fake Chinese income" mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks

#60

Post by soco »

user3939382 wrote: post #43

HSBC funneled $1B (that we know about) for cartels, it came out as 100% knowingly committed, and no one went to jail. Basically the government asked for their cut. Why wouldn't do they this again and again? They are above the law, they are the law.

Credit Suisse finally sunk because of such business and more, so there is (very very little, I know) hope.
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