Nanjing, November 5 (Xinhua Finance) -- The incident of "2.8 billion yuan of depositors of Bohai Bank being pledged" is still fermenting. On the evening of November 4, Bohai Bank issued a fact sheet saying that the parties concerned, Franciscan Trust Group, were aware of the pledge and were not simply depositing customers as they claimed to be externally. Subsequently, Jimin crediblely responded, "Our group has no knowledge of the pledge of deposits! ”
The merits of this have yet to be further verified by the relevant departments, but this incident has unveiled the most hidden corner of the deposit pledge market: the "unspoken rules" that cannot be put on the table in this industry but actually exist, banks, depositors and lenders have their own demands, and if this "pledged" game is to be carried out, generally speaking, at least two of them need to "cooperate". Is this a regulatory loophole or an industry practice?
Industry experts said that such events are generally accompanied by internal and external collusion, and it is possible to achieve "unconsciousness" without risk, and the real default is not common. However, deposits, as the safest bottom line of banks, such incidents will trigger depositors' concerns about the safety of bank deposits, and sound the alarm for the banking industry.
You know! vs I don't know!
With the public announcement of Bohai Bank Nanjing Branch and Jimin Trust Group on the 4th, the "2.8 billion yuan deposit pledge" incident is even more confusing.
Bohai Bank Nanjing Branch said that Jimin Credible was aware of the matter, not a simple deposit customer it claimed to be, and in about a year or so, Jimin Trust also received three times the interest on the bank's deposits from Huaye Petrochemical.
Jimin Credible said: "Our group once again reiterates that the two subsidiaries of the 2.8 billion yuan deposits were pledged by bohai Bank Nanjing Branch and did not provide financing guarantees from a third party, and our group was unaware of the whole operation process. ”
Previously, Jimin Credible, a large pharmaceutical company, said that two subsidiaries of the group had deposited a total of 3.3 billion yuan in the Nanjing branch of Bohai Bank, of which 2.8 billion yuan was unknowingly pledged. A subsidiary, Wuxi Jiyu Shanhe Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (Shanhe Pharmaceutical), reported to Wuxi police on September 3.
"In this process, if the bank cooperates, it can be repeatedly carried out and the leverage can be amplified, that is to say, Huaye Petrochemical is just a capital channel." However, because Huaye Petrochemical also made a pledge guarantee loan in this process, and there was a loan default, the game chain was broken. The above-mentioned insider told reporters that the Nanjing branch of Bohai Bank was involved in a series of illegal operations, and it remains to be investigated whether it involves other enterprise personnel or even enterprises.
"Unconventional" operations in regular business
Pledge of certificates of deposit was originally a common pledge loan business of banks.
Banks control according to their different risk control conditions, some banks require that depositors and lenders must have a relationship, and some banks do not have this requirement. Its process requirements are more stringent, involving multiple business lines and the review of risk control departments, the company's legal person, the signature of the manager and the seal verification and other links are more, and the pledge of a large amount also needs to be approved at a higher level of approval authority.
Wu Zhibiao, director of Tianjin Junxing Law Firm, said, "In cases where deposits are privately pledged, it is generally for internal and external collusion to forge certificates of deposit to pledge loans, and usually pay high benefit fees to depositors or intermediaries who pull deposits, otherwise enterprises will rarely directly deposit large certificates of deposit, and the interest rate is too low to be crossed." ”
"According to the certificate of deposit pledge process, the possibility of the bank completing this business alone is low, and at least the cooperation of an external manager is required, so there is a high possibility of internal and external collusion to complete such operations." The person in charge of the relevant business of a branch of a joint-stock bank said.
In fact, Bohai Bank Nanjing Branch is not an isolated case. In many places, there have been cases of depositors' depositors being inexplicably pledged loans, and many of them are inextricably linked to the ghosts in the bank.
According to a judgment disclosed by the judgment document network, the depositor Ms. Gao handled the deposit business of a large deposit certificate of 10 million yuan at the Dalian branch of a bank, but a few days later it was found that the certificate of deposit was pledged and frozen, which was used to provide a pledge guarantee for the borrower Tang Mou to issue a loan of 9.97 million yuan. Ms. Gao did not know the borrower at all, did not sign a power of attorney, and did not do notarize. The bank said that when the borrower Tang applied for a loan, he provided Ms. Gao's notarized power of attorney at a notary office, entrusted others to handle the pledge guarantee procedures for large deposit certificates on his behalf, the bank reviewed and confirmed the authenticity of the notary certificate, and according to the notarization entrustment, the large deposit certificate of Ms. Gao was pledged and frozen. The results were confirmed that there was a possibility of forgery of the notarial certificate, and Tang was suspected of defrauding the loan.
From March to October 2015, Zhang Moukui, director of the business department of the Bazhou Branch of a bank, took advantage of his position to act as a "ghost in the bank" many times, entrusting intermediaries to lure depositors to deposits, and instructing others to forge depositors' identity information, impersonating depositors to go to the bank to apply for a pledge loan of deposit certificates, and defrauding the bank of 25.13 million yuan.
Is it a loophole in the system or an unspoken rule in the industry?
According to the reporter's investigation, the lender involved in the case, Huaye Petrochemical, also has doubts. According to banking insiders revealed to reporters, Huaye Petrochemical's identity is a bit like a "capital broker", assisting banks to do "impulse" business, if it is not a loan default, Jimin Credible may not even find that their deposits have been pledged to guarantee things.
Qixinbao's equity penetration information shows that at present, Huaye Petrochemical is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Jiangsu Yizhuang Trading Co., Ltd., but it was only changed on October 27. Previously, huaye petrochemical's wholly-owned shareholder was Jiangsu Huazhiye Energy Development Co., Ltd., which was a wholly-owned subsidiary of Beijing Huachang Real Estate Co., Ltd., which was a wholly-owned subsidiary of China National Petroleum Corporation. However, PetroChina's official website issued a statement on September 26 saying that it was found that criminals had fraudulently registered Jiangsu Huazhiye Energy Development Co., Ltd. in the name of Beijing Huachang Real Estate Co., Ltd.
That is to say, after PetroChina issued a "statement on cracking down on counterfeiting", on October 27, Huaye Petrochemical urgently changed its shareholders and disassociated itself from PetroChina. At present, Huaye Petrochemical's equity is controlled by Bai Penggang after the equity penetration, and this person holds more than 40 companies in total.
The reporter called the relevant person in charge of Huaye Petrochemical, who said that the company had long been dissolved, but learned from the Jiangsu Provincial Taxation Department that the company was operating normally. According to the relevant person in charge of Xuanwu District of Nanjing City, where Huaye Petrochemical is located, the company's operating performance is average and does not belong to the key enterprises in the region.
According to the reporter's investigation, the business cooperation between Huaye Petrochemical and Bohai Bank Nanjing Branch included two equity pledges in September 2021 in addition to the 2.8 billion yuan certificate of deposit pledge loan that was accidentally exposed. According to the recording released by Jimin Trust, Dong Yun of huaye petrochemical capital department admitted that he had never had any contact with any personnel of Jimin trust, but had always communicated and interacted with Bohai Bank.
"This incident is shocking and has sounded the alarm for a sound banking and corporate internal control system." Liu Junhai, director of the Institute of Commercial Law of Chinese Min University, said that the relevant regulatory departments and the police should join forces to find out as soon as possible whether there were any acts such as bank leaders and staff in order to obtain improper benefits, internal and external collusion and malicious collusion by lawbreakers.
At the same time, regulatory authorities should give full play to their authority to grant market access, administrative guidance, administrative supervision and administrative punishment, and take this as an opportunity to carry out a carpet and all-round risk investigation nationwide on whether there is any illegal act of misappropriating deposits as pledges. "Starting from this case, the regulatory authorities should study targeted solutions to innovate regulatory means and eliminate regulatory blind spots, so as to eradicate regulatory arbitrage." Liu Junhai said.
!["This is my family's money!" A woman wanted to buy a wedding house for her grandson, so she went to the bank to withdraw money with the 500,000 deposit certificate left by her wife. She thought to herself that the money she had saved so hard to buy a house for her grandson[fig]](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAP///wAAACwAAAAAAQABAAACAkQBADs=)