HSBC. How bad is it really?

[freshwest]

27. Thanks for the KYC link. Such rules are generally decried in CTs. We glaze over the facts too much.

Despite my notion of independence because of the end of the British lease on Hong Kong, still being owned by the UK puts them under KYC laws passed in 2007.

The Wikipedia piece shows the law is not in place in several nations. And it's the eternally evil, international banking system, blah, blah, blah. That is exactly what found these fraudsters who are stealing the Commons.

This was corruption by those who considered themselves above the law. Bank and corporate deregulation is part of negative libertarianism. Sounds like the elite's version of the sovereign citizens:

'No government tells me what to do!'

The philosophy described:

How Freedom Became Tyranny

By George Monbiot - December 19, 2011

Freedom: who could object? Yet this word is now used to justify a thousand forms of exploitation. Throughout the rightwing press and blogosphere, among thinktanks and governments, the word excuses every assault on the lives of the poor, every form of inequality and intrusion to which the 1% subject us. How did libertarianism, once a noble impulse, become synonymous with injustice?

In the name of freedom – freedom from regulation – the banks were permitted to wreck the economy. In the name of freedom, taxes for the super-rich are cut. In the name of freedom, companies lobby to drop the minimum wage and raise working hours. In the same cause, US insurers lobby Congress to thwart effective public healthcare; the government rips up our planning laws(1); big business trashes the biosphere. This is the freedom of the powerful to exploit the weak, the rich to exploit the poor.

Right-wing libertarianism recognises few legitimate constraints on the power to act, regardless of the impact on the lives of others. In the UK it is forcefully promoted by groups like the TaxPayers’ Alliance, the Adam Smith Institute, the Institute of Economic Affairs and Policy Exchange(2). Their conception of freedom looks to me like nothing but a justification for greed.

So why have we been been so slow to challenge this concept of liberty? I believe that one of the reasons is as follows. The great political conflict of our age – between neocons and the millionaires and corporations they support on one side and social justice campaigners and environmentalists on the other – has been mischaracterised as a clash between negative and positive freedoms...

Much more at link:

http://www.monbiot.com/2011/12/19/how-freedom-became-tyranny/

Van Jones explained negative libertarianism and how it is leading not to government tyranny, but corporate tyranny. The rightwingers are working for the same goals they say they are against, as they won't look to the end results. I see the same on the far left, sadly, in calling for exiting the public square and in effect, ceding the last of the Commons to the same forces and corporations:

And your link with the 'anti-money laundering software' link means that HSBC had the tools to discern these thefts. As you said, some of them didn't want to act upon that data as mandated.

JMHO...