Thank you for David Enrich's fascinating article, "The Money Behind Trump's Money". I read and re-read it with intense interest.
As a retired Realtor, I well remember when Trump's people presented his plan to build condominiums adjacent to the Galleria. No one in our office or in the offices of other real estate companies throughout Houston would agree to be involved financially or professionally.
As described by Mr. Enrich, one does clearly see the connection between Deutsche Bank's internal schemes, Donald Trump, and the trillion dollar credit card on which our 'successful economy' is based.
Regards,
Doris Murdock, subscriber
Houston TX
8
An interesting obvious question is "Did Putin's cabal of oligarchs, or the Russian government itself, secretly provide any guarantees for the Deutsche Bank loans to the flake?" That certainly would help us understand some of what we have seen in the behavior of the POTUS toward Putin and Russia. It would also explain why Deutsche Bank continued to be willing to deal with him at all.
It's time for people in the agencies that know the answer to let the rest of us know.
12
This very long article on Deutsche Bank and Trump is notable for what is missing – any mention of Vladimir Putin. There is one mention of “the Kremlin”, 2 mentions of “Russian oligarchs”, and 3 mentions of “money laundering”. But the author seems to be afraid to say anything directly.
Other articles are far more direct. See this recent report, entitled “Russian Government Bank Deposited $500M into Deutsche Bank Subsidiary as it Lent to Trump”
https://forensicnews.net/2020/01/21/russian-government-bank-deposited-500-million-into-deutsche-bank-subsidiary-as-it-lent-to-trump/
15
Trump has sailed through life untouched always with his enablers, from father Fred, to Deutsche Bank to the US Senate.
8
"Merrill Lynch learned this lesson the hard way when it helped Trump ... Trump threatened to tie his lenders up in years of bankruptcy-court litigation if they didn’t agree to let him largely off the hook for what he owed."
In short, they forgot the old rule: When you owe thou$sand$ to the bank they bank owns you. When you owe million$ to the bank you own the bank.
9
Deutsche Bank's connection with the Bank of Cypress ( Wilber Ross was on the board) and that Banks's connection with Russian billionaires tells the tale about Trump and his finances. You don't think Putin knows.
13
As Nancy said, all roads with trump lead to Putin.....
When do you think the dems will use this info? I think never.
7
Interesting how President Trump had luck on his side which allowed him to keep getting loans from Deutsche Bank when virtually no other institution would lend to him. Actually this provides more evidence to bolster the belief among Evangelical Christians that President Trump has God on his side and has indeed been chosen by God to make America great again. Whatever one believes, who can argue with God?
1
There is a reason why Trump has fought tooth & nail to keep his tax records & the rest of his financial records secret. They will reveal the full extent of his corruption & the likely compromised nature of his relationship with Putin & Russia.
19
To quote a reader in today's "San Diego Union-Tribune":
"Germany, if you're listening, get a copy of Donald Trump's tax returns from Deutsche Bank.
Made my day.
36
Very interestng and informative, however it did not get into the primary (Bombshell!) issue which is the allegation that the bank was protected by Trump loan guarentees provided by none other than a Russian state run bank, ie Putin ... the article does not even mention this recent allegation by a former Deusch Bank employee which has probably been suppresed by unkown powers, and has been totally off all news discussions only weeks after coming out ...
19
What has been alleged elsewhere is that the Deutsche Bank loans Trump defaulted on were syndicated to Russian oligarchs, who may also have been counter-parties to the derivatives and contingent liabilities that the bank sold as insurance against such defaults.
If so Trump still owes those oligarchs for their huge losses on his earlier DB loans. Thereby demonstrating how absolutely Putin puppeteers Trump.
17
Deutsche Bank was a conduit for Russian money. Russian money bought the White House. Putin now owns Donald Trump. That's how it looks to me.
35
It would be interesting to see who the whales and minnows the casinos comped. I also wonder how much muscle they used if someone didn't pay their gambling debts.
Now that Mr. Bloomberg is running I will mention in each comments that I'm glad we now have a viable candidate to kick Rump out in November. I even have a VP candidate: General Russel Honore' who saved New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Saving Bush 43's rump as well.
8
More articles like this, NYT -- thanks David Enrich! Horrible and important.
12
If anyone wonders why Barr has dictated that no investigations into political candidates can be initiated unless he approves, look no further than this reporting by the Times
28
A perfect storm of incompetence, greed and ignorance. Had Deutsche Bank not financed Trump, he would not be in the White House today. Someday, Trump will not be in office and the truth of all of this will come out. I pray he is still alive. Not that it will faze him, as he will call it 'smart'. BTW, the property in Westchester mentioned? Simultaneously, he sued in court to reduce the value of that asset to below the purchase price (even after injection more than an additional 10 million in improvements). He has no shame, as no one else matters. That he is such a successful conman shows how stupid so many people are. (Yes, stupid.)
22
@Bruce Maier
Our job as voters is to knock this carnival barker out in November. Then let the state and federal prosecutors take the whole family down with the exception of Tiffany and the Baron.
18
@Benito Agreed, but I would except Melania as well.
3
Why don’t we think that Saudi Arabia hacked Jeff Bezos’s phone as “a favor” to Trump?
14
Does it even matter anymore? We already know more than we could ever want to about this terrible human being. His supporters do not care. While he may not be the kind of person they would want at their dinner table with impressionable young children, they would give their own lives to protect him, no matter what. Thievery. Nepotism. Amorality. Prevarication and uncontrollable lying. Ignorance. Meanness. Adultery. misogyny. Racism. Ungenerousity. Lack of morals, ethics or good manners. Admiration for conspiracy mongers, bigots, loud mouths and thugs. You name it. He really could murder someone and fondle their preteens and they will support him till their last breath. Just plain weird.
22
Excellent, with an asterisk. Deutsche Bank is deeper into relationships with Russian oligarchs than we get from this piece. Their money has found its way into Trump's enterprises, facilitated by the "Vehicles of Vrablic." It's inconceivable that Ackerman wouldn't know every move she made, or contemplated.
9
I knew the minute that Justice Kennedy decided to "retire" that Trump somehow has something on Kennedy's son, from their time together at Deutsche Bank.
That sudden retirement, so Trump could appoint a fraud to replace him and begin to manipulate the court, never made sense. I suspected at the time it had something to do with the younger Kennedy's ties to Trump. Now I know for sure.
A Supreme Court Judge and his son's shady deals with a deadbeat developer turned criminal president, a banker's suicide in LA, a president with American and Russian mob ties? We are living in a John Grisham novel, only it's not fiction.
24
Bloomberg may be the only candidate who can beat tiny trump. He’s got more money, he’s self made, a New Yorker who people actually respect, and he’s a SUCCESSFUL business man, all things that will drive trump CRAZY! It’s clear to see that the GOP is running scared whenever Bloomberg’s name is mentioned.
I loved seeing Steve Bannon in a recent interview saying trump is really afraid of Bernie (now that Bidens chances have been ruined ) and they’re ABSOLUTELY not worried about Bloomberg because America would NEVER vote for an oligarch. (We have one in the office now, Steve) Nice try at reverse psychology!
11
Crony capitalism. By law the profit is private whilst the debt is open for all to partake. Perhaps we could somehow join this to Uncle Sam's credit card and leave the entire imbroglio to the next generation.
1
While this article offers a glimpse inside the dealings of a corrupt bank, I don't think that any of Trump's shady-illegal activity will ever be made public. His cult now controls all levers of power and they will never vote/rule against him.
Unless we're very lucky, the only way this ends is through a collapse of the global economy or U.S. democracy. Given that it's Trump, who has destroyed everything he's touched, those are more likely.
7
I am soon to be 74 years old and know my days in this life are coming to a close. I just hope I live long enough to see Trump leave office kicking and screaming lies and all sorts of nutty conspiracy claims that he was illegally dethroned even after serving another four more years. What will be left of our Democracy and rule of law at the federal level when that happens is frightening. I sometimes think that Americans for Trump have a death wish for our nation and won't be happy until they get a dictator for president like Putin. We're almost there and the uninspiring Democratic candidates above all, Comrade Bernie, only make feel more confident in my opinion.
10
And the point is what?
Big bank and the financial crises?
Real estate landing dangers?
Big ticket loans and corporate decision making politics?
That great white whale sightings?
Low crimes and felonies.
The usual suspects, making money the old-fashioned way - financial cretins lusting for fees & bonuses, with complete moral turpitude.
Great piece, though it inevitably creates more questions than it answers. Keep digging, please, Mr. Enrich.
Portrait of a Con-Artist. Plays like a very Grimm fairy tale.
2
Maybe Trump will start another investigation - Supreme Justice Kennedy father and son- along with the Bidens. Should make great reading.
2
If only the NFL would have let him buy the Buffalo Bills!
2
Deutsche bank was not the only bank involved in the LIBOR issue. There were plenty of other money center banks involved. Read the case and settlement.
A bank encouraging purchasers in a building in which they financed is not unusual.Each purchaser is a diversification of the risk formally attributed to the developer. Banks who offered the construction loan, or an acquisition loan will offer end loan financing to the eventual Unit purchaser. It is very common.
While Deutsche bank may have pushed the envelope, no American taxpayer funds were involved in it, unlike Bank of America which took gazillions in guaranteed bail out loans. At the peak of the financial crisis my 15-year-old nephew had a greater net worth than some of those banks guaranteed by the US
government.
As the article rightfully points out the Trump organization has paid back most of its debt, and there’s no default.
The hotel business is risky and subject to fluctuation due to the economy. There are plenty of other hotel developers who got in trouble during that era. There were developers with equal to or greater losses in 1985 -1990 during the era of the Resolution Trust Corporation.
Take a look at some of the well-known companies who issued high-yield bonds in the 1980s. Some of them are still in business today, and others have fallen by the way side. Recall the Chrysler loan guarantees. Yet The Trump organization is still standing and still paying its bills.
1
@Thomas Fastiggi
The Trump Organization is still standing and SOMEONE is paying its bills but it certainly isn't The Trump Organization's money being used to settle accounts—and THAT bill will come due sooner rather than later.
10
This is the most under reported story of the Trump presidency and in particular, of his candidacy when it might have made some difference. It also went largely examined when Anthony Kennedy, Justin Kennedy’s father, unexpectedly resigned his supreme court seat, for what are documented here as obvious conflicts of interest. Why? The connections between these players were well-known. My guess is that tentacles of the corruption of the international banking industry reach as far into corporate media as they do into politics. It will inevitably crash the economy again. It’s convinced me that Elizabeth Warren is the only presidential candidate with the knowledge and experience to deal with this mess.
10
@Maggie
what is required of the Democratic candidate is the ability to defeat Trump and—hopefully—make gains in Congressional races.
Senator Warren is not that person—I wish she were.
4
This tells the story of a financial industry that has lost its way because of questionable loans? Really? Did we learn nothing from the financial crisis of 2008? That time most large banks lost ALL of their assets due to questionable loans and only survived because of coordinated worldwide government bailout. The Deutsche Bank example is inconsequential by comparison.
2
It is probably more than coincidental that Justice Kennedy retired when he did.
It is also more than coincidental that Bowers and far too many other Deutsche Bank staffers died "by suicide".
Hopefully the author's complete book takes up both of these issues.
13
An interesting read on Deutsche bank, but too many "ifs", "could" and "probably's" in this article when it comes to Trump.
We need to stop pinning our hopes on some new piece of evidence providing the silver bullet to proving that this president is of questionable moral and legal character. Those of us who voted against him already know this. Those who voted for him won't care. Each new accusation energizes his supporters and motivates them to see that he is re-elected. As we have all seen by recent events, there is little correlation between doing the right thing (by investigating/impeaching, etc) and getting justice. My high horse is thirsty for victory.
Every democrats need to put 100% focus on winning the Presidential election AND ensuring that we are doing everything possible to take the Senate and keep the House. If we are not unified and focused on that front, we will find ourselves wringing our hands and asking why our thirst for justice remains unquenched.
My suggestion: Volunteer at phone banks, get out the vote, donate to candidates running against Republicans who are at risk (regardless of whether they are in your state) and put out political ads appealing to the moral conscious of swing voters by challenging the perception that the economy matters more than ethics when it comes making/keeping America great.
10
"You too can be a millionaire by using other people's money to buy property and then flip it for a profit"--like those old TV infomercials on late-night. "You'll make zillions", said Trump University. He does it by lying, cheating and stealing from all those who believe in him. He even has the cheek to stiff his bankers. This man is no good, I don't care how popular he is. He's a fraud.
20
This article does not peel back enough of the curtain. To do so would require the quality of a Ronan Farrow. The entire world of stock market banking and private banking is saturated with crooks.
10
I guess it's not surprising that Deutsche Bank operations offer us such disgusting instances of providing comfort zones for Trump. This is the entity that helped financed the construction of Auschwitz.
11
Justice Anthony Kennedy decides to "spend more time with his family" immediately after the occupant of the white house arrives. Kennedy's son is in close association with the occupant and his financial dealings with Deutsche bank. Something is rotten here.
20
My thought exactly.
9
Waiting for his tax report........
5
The article mentions Josef Ackerman, a disgraced Swiss banker, who aptly moved from Deutsche Bank CEO to the Bank of Cyprus, the money laundering capital of Europe without mentioning his disastrous and self-enriching course he put Deutsche Bank on and his fondness for buying politicians, including Angela Merkel. (Held his birthday party at her chancellory).
9
It's Billions meets Ozark! But complicated for my netflix brain. Can the NYTimes possibly create a fun infographic/visual timeline...maybe with related deaths by suicide as outliers and showing favouring policy actions as POTUS, and blank spots for future reveals, traced funds, and especially colour coded tally of money lost, wasted, or debt-accrued. Like a string board linking up all features, but colourful, simple and overtly focussed on the alleged yet emergent incriminating implications.
5
Before Trump announced his candidacy both of his adult sons told reporters that Russians financed their golf empire and that they go to Russia all the time. Now you know why Trump is trying so hard to cover up everything involving his finances.
17
Can't think of a better time for someone to leak and publish Trump's tax returns.
7
@PDX
Did you ever see a corporate tax return?
It has only lines and numbers, no names, and no explanations.
This article explains a whole lot of what is going on the world today. I took a shower after reading it.
4
This story about Trump is also the story of America, American banks, American business and American politics and what it all has become: Rotten to the core. It's all just one big fugazi. God help us all.
4
Thank you New York Times for printing Mr. Enrich's piece and thank you Mr. Enrich for your effort in brilliantly clarifying the connections and corruption of the Trump Presidency. That we have a sociopath for a president is known to most informed Americans, but how we got here is something we will learn a bit later...
9
It is interesting that Mr. Enrich has left out what happened to those first two deals that Trump did with Deutsche Bank. Based on public records, Mr. Trump got $125 million from DB in 1998 on 40 Wall Street. This was repaid in full, and refinanced by Ladder Capital, with a current loan of $140 million. In a 2016 history of the building, Bloomberg News valued 40 Wall at $550 million. That suggests Trump took out $15 million in cash, likely all his investment, and has an unrealized gain of $410 million. That is quite a deal!
The second, Trump World Tower, was financed with a $300 million construction loan listed from two institutions, Bayer Hypo Vereinsbank and Union Labor Life Insurance. At ~900,000 sq ft, and sales listed on Streeteasy from its 2001-2004 completion it appears Tump sold condos for $500-$3,000/sq ft. This suggests a profit between $175 million and $600 million. DB arranged the construction loan and agreed to take over any unpaid balance after pre-sales were used to pay off debt at completion. It appears Trump sold at least $300 million of condos at completion, so DB never advanced any money at all.
If Trump cleared between $585 million and $1.01 billion, and DB was repaid, it would appear that Mr. Offit, Mr. Kennedy and their colleagues were quite good at their jobs, and Mr. Trump may have done two "deals of a lifetime" in a few months in 1998. What possible reason could there be for this information being left out of an article about Trump and his lender?
6
This article makes it clear that there is a "club" in which a cluster or people think they are anointed to do whatever is necessary to become wealthier. All fraud is rationalized and all secrets hidden as implicate one, would open the entire membership to scrutiny. So now we are here and as noted in an October 2019 NYTimes article "Federal Reserve Board members voted on Thursday to adjust key bank regulations put in place after the financial crisis, enacting a series of changes that one board governor, Lael Brainard, warned could weaken “core safeguards.”
Why is this not covered in the Sunday new shows? Why is this not addressed on those cable shows that do scrutinize Trumps illegal behaviors and schemes? Why are these questions not addressed in Democratic debates? In other words - all arenas which would make the public aware?
Elizabeth Warren is the candidate most familiar with the impact of Federal Reserve Board decisions on the consumer. Why issn't she - along with a panel of other experts given air time to make the public aware?
10
When reading the part about how the FBI is investigating Deutsche Bank, a disturbing thought came to mind. A few days ago the news came out that His Corpulence (aka AG William Barr) issued a directive that investigations of anyone running for president (or VP) required his express approval.
Does anybody know whether that would extend to the FBI investigation referenced above? It's possible that b/c the info that is the subject of the matter that the Supreme Court will hear in a few months may be different inasmuch as that process was initiated either by the House or NY state (or maybe both, I've forgotten - there's so much 'filz' [a great German word that describes the corruption surrounding Trump and his world] in all this that I can't keep it all straight); but even if so, if the parties who are seeking that info are in some way dependent on the FBI's skills and resources (which are significant and may make all the difference), then interference by Barr would be disastrous.
Does anyone who's had the patience to read this overly long comment have any idea about how this plays out?
6
As lead investor in the Bank of Cyprus, Wilbur Ross tapped as its chairman Josef Ackermann, former CEO of Deutsche Bank. Under Ackermann Deutsche Bank had loaned Trump $364,000,000 -- loans now subject to investigations.
A real loan is difficult to distinguish from a "loan-back" -- a money laundering technique that requires the complicity of one or more banks.
An example: Say Ivan has $100 million in dirty money to launder. He wants to create for this illegitimate money a legitimate source.
Ivan deposits the $100 million at a bank account in Cyprus. He commits this $100 million account to a major, respected, but complicit bank in Frankfurt as collateral. The Frankfurt bank then issues to Ivan a formal loan in the amount of $100 million. This constitutes the “loan-back.”
Ivan has exchanged his dirty $100 million in cash for a clean $100 million loaned to him with complete and impeccable legal documentation. As a loan it is not taxable. The collateral account in Cyprus is invisible, but it is now in the hands of the big bank in Frankfurt. The big bank has risked none of its own capital but will receive interest and fees. The loan is pure fiction, a profitable pass-through.
If the destination for the laundered money is US real estate, the loan-back could be made directly to a complicit US real estate developer. If the funds were received as a capital investment, they could substantially change, behind the scenes, the ownership pie of that developer’s company.
9
An old truism:
"When money speaks all law is silent."
6
Interesting article.
1
"Before and during World War II, the bank was a leading financier of the Nazis, helping to pay for projects including the construction of Auschwitz" Do whatever it takes is not a new concept for the bank.
8
Thank you for the powerhouse reporting. It's absolutely invaluable.
4
I believe the stated timing of the Deutsche Bank entry into the riskier areas of real estate lending is a bit off. In the late 80's I worked as a negotiator for a very large developer and we borrowed $550 million from them to "take out" the construction loan. I got out of the business shortly after this and learned that the loan -- then in default by the early 90's -- was purchased by a "vulture" fund for $.50 on the dollar. Real estate developers build because they can borrow money, not because they create brilliant and original developments.
3
The issue isn't Trump. It's the bank. Why wouldn't you take the banks money since they seemed so keen on giving it to Trump? Great story but its really on the bank, not Trump to determine whether to take the risk or not. I'd say he is brilliant to be able to get the loans based on what seems to be no more than a relationship. Every deal worked out for Trump. The corporate bankruptcy laws haven't really changed in spite of bad actors like the banks who really are the ones at fault here for taking the risk. We debate the "we wouldn't have done that" or "that is wrong." Bottomline, it was there for the taking. If not Trump someone else. Another key point. Without a taxing authority there is no government. You need banks to have a means to collect the money for taxes. Governments are beholden to banks because of this. We forget the House of Rothschild bailed out this country in the late 1800s. The banks do as they want.
Deutsche Bank has been an enthusiastic long time player in all sorts of shady deals. Let's remember the 2006-2008 wave of "Liar Loans", mortgages granted with incomplete or fraudlant information, then immediately securitized. Yes, D.B. was right in the middle of that too. D.B. helped bring the system down, but made plenty of money while happily doing so. When are they going to pay for their crimes?
4
What a great article - thank you. All the things the little guy does not know about going on everyday within the higher money levels of society. The enormous debts , the non-payment of money owed, this ability to just declare bankruptcy which gives the big-money debtors immediate relief the rest of us never get ! I really do not wish to belong to their life-style, but this shows just how much controls are needed to prevent their risky behavior impacting us ! They have rigged/are rigging things to suit themselves bit by bit unless we can stop them in November ! THIS is why he has the support from Wall Street !
2
While reading the financial saga full of miraculous outcomes, it is quite clear that there is a heavenly realm where one can default, lie, and sue a bank and then be rewarded with a multimillion $ loan. As some noticed, DB most likely sold these loans, in one way or another only to collect more loan fees, Losses probably registered as dip in some mutual fund, The bankers and Mr: Trump benefited; the loss has been passed to investors as market fluctuation, and apparently all of it is perfectly legal.
8
I put this with the SDNY taking down trump for campaign finance as "Cohen committed a felony under direction of Person A(Trump)", the Emouluments clause, Congress "shall" get his tax return, the Mueller Report("mo Mueller, mo problems" I must have seen ad 1000 times on MSNBC, Impreachment, Bolton Book,etc. Nothing sticks and this is what every developer does. In Conn so many banks were taken down with developers but DB is too big I guess. Nice reporting and I read it but will have zero effect
3
Enrich’s book comes out in a few weeks, soon to be followed by Bolton’s. The Impeachment trial is complete now, but this story is not.
11
This is all so very disturbing on so many level. The President for one...how anyone so guilty of finance corruption (and stealing basically) can stand in front of the American people without feeling an ounce of guilt. And then the bankers who saw his mess at Merrill Lynch and then let him do it again at Deutsche Bank - wow, just wow!
And why can't the IRS just give up his tax returns? Who is the unethical person at the IRS that won't just hand them over??? Why does the request for information keep getting blocked? It's so infuriating and it's a total cover up.
This piece is really great - it needs to be a Podcast!!
11
Hercules didn’t have to shovel so much when he cleaned out the Augean Stables as the poor, deluded American public will have to clean up behind the current President. As I read this article, it hit me that while I knew Trump was a slick cheater, I had not considered that he might break the country. If he has four more years the country will be a dry husk. Evidently he can just do what he wants.
10
Interesting how the guys at Deutsche Bank knew he was mobbed up and most people in the NY metro area who had followed news knew it, but the 40% base is still oblivious to his corruption.
20
@Wende - and where do most of the 'base' live - out there in the boonies, knowing nothing of trump's history, and seeing him as just another money-making 'billionaire' that will somehow make his 'success' rub off on them ! Yet I - an immigrant in 1980 - already knew what he was within a couple of years of being here...how comes others are so ignorant ??? trump is the very epitome of SLICK - he does whatever he has to do to get what he wants.....even now !
2
Great work David Enrich and NYT.
These financials lead to the reality of the situation — the future uncovering of the underlying cover-ups.
3
Just remember, when the economy failed last we bailed out the banks at the expense of ordinary working Americans. Deutsche Bank is not some crazy outlier in its amorality.
2
Not sure why Deutsche Bank still has a license to operate in the US. Will all the scandals and the track record of aiding and abetting crimes, they should have been evicted a long time ago. Apparently Germany has no control over the bank's overseas behavior.
3
@Cfiverson
That division was supervised from London, while Frankfurt had the boring stuff.
1
Deutsche Bank - Trump relationship
First at all I would like to express my respect to the author. I have my doubts that a German newspaper would publish these details of Deutsche Bank in this form. Since the "peanuts" affaire caused by Hilmar Kopper in 1994, a 50 million loss for small craft businesses, Deutsche Bank regulary guaranteed bad news, especially in business. Actually the result of yearlong and continuous mismanagement is an enormously bad share price. Since 2008 the share price fell from over 95 USD to to actually 10 USD. At all, this has to be said, since Deutsche Bank tried the international big business they continuously made losses and produced scandals of international matters, i.e. Libor scandal costs, 2.3 billion E.
As a result of these yearlong mismanagement, Mr. Achleitner, chairman of the supervisory board DBank, declared 2019 to go back to the traditional, and much more than this, national business. At all it is allowed to say, that a former bankrupted entrepreneur, who never ever would had been financed like that in Germany, is now president of die US. Ironically the bank who secured his financial survival, is now fighting not to become an candidate for an friendly, or even not friendly, take oder.
3
A private bank brings investment deals to its private clients - no public stock exchange involved. Deutsche had many Russian oligarch and gangsters as clients. Were they the ones making the loans, through Deutsche Bank, to Trump and Kushner?
15
It would be too too delicious for the next global
financial crisis to start inside any of the many devices DB set up to help leverage trump and shield him from his creditors.
Or is that asking
too much from the deities of finance? Don't they
know a good irony when they see one?
3
Deutsche Bank, Germany's largest financial institution, played an important role in the expropriation of Jewish-owned enterprises during the Nazi dictatorship, both in the existing territories of Germany, and in the areas seized by the German army during World War II, particularly Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland.
"The Deutsche Bank and the Nazi Economic War against the Jews: The Expropriation of Jewish-Owned Property"
https://www.amazon.com/Deutsche-Bank-Nazi-Economic-against/dp/0521803292
5
This article was published in 2017 by Politico. I post an excerpt here. Be advised this current situation has all been planned by Putin. "(Putin's)... worldview and objectives are made abundantly clear in speeches, op-eds, official policy and national strategy documents, journal articles, interviews, etc.
First, it is a war. A thing to be won, decisively — not a thing to be negotiated or bargained. It’s all one war: Ukraine, Turkey, Syria, the Baltics, Georgia.
Second, it’s all one war machine. Military, technological, information, diplomatic, economic, cultural, criminal, and other tools are all controlled by the state and deployed toward one set of strategic objectives...the goal is simply to replace Western-style democratic regimes with illiberal, populist, or nationalist ones.
Third, information warfare is not about creating an alternate truth, by eroding our basic ability to distinguish truth at all. It is not “propaganda” as we’ve come to think of it... designed to make us, the targets, act against our own best interests.
Fourth, the diplomatic side of this non-linear war...is... what the Kremlin calls a “multi-vector” foreign policy, undermining the strength of Western institutions by coalescing alternate — ideally temporary and limited — centers of power. Rather than a stable world order undergirded by the U.S. and its allies, the goal is an unstable new world order of “all against all.”
trumpty and the GOP are playing tic, tac, toe--Putin-- 4D chess.
18
@Citizen 0809
most disconcerting is your case has been made repeatedly for four years and yet Trump manages to hold the GOP by throat with one hand and giving the other to Putin to do with as he pleases.
3
The NYT is constrained by their adherence to journalistic principles but I'm not...when the Times writes "if, might, could" you should read "is, definitely is, absolutely beyond a shadow of a doubt is."
22
Your average small time con/fraudster kites checks, eventually the law catches up with him, arrest made, charges filed, etc., resulting in either fines/jail time/asset confiscation, some or all three.
How is what trump done his whole life, only mostly with other people's money to the tune of many millions any different? The small time crook gets an orange jumpsuit, the big time crook gets Air Force One.
23
Don Henley: “A man with a briefcase can steal far more money than any man with a gun.”
8
I was eating dinner when I read this and seriously had to go throw up. Sorry to gross everyone out. But this is revolting. And nothing and no one can stop any of it from rolling on.
10
Deutsche Bank has been fined billions of dollars for mortgage "irregularities". And yet here in the lower Hudson Valley DB mortgages regularly and frequently turn up in foreclosure proceedings. Maybe justifiably so or maybe not. Has DB even paid a small fraction of this fine? It's not clear. Furthermore a DB Google search uncovers many other fines. From the hundreds of millions to the billions. Again not clear if they were actually paid. Why is DB not taken over by the Federal Government? I hope that one day the whole fraudulent edifice will come crashing down. But I fear there will be a lot of collateral damage mostly borne by the innocent. Meanwhile the grifters in the WH and their friends will escape unscathed.
7
Thanks! Perhaps the most insightful part of this article is at the very end.
"After stepping down from the lectern, Trump shook hands with the dignitaries in the audience. In the front row were the Supreme Court justices.
Trump moved down the line until he got to Anthony Kennedy. As Trump pumped the justice’s hand, Kennedy congratulated him on a successful speech. “Very nice, thank you,” Trump replied. “Say hello to your boy,” he added, patting the justice’s arm. “Special guy.”
14
Even if Trump is a con man, I do have to respect the man's hustle. I guess that's America for you. You don't necessarily have to do something "good" you just have to be doing something and apparently one gets rewarded.
Something to learn even from someone as outrageous as Trump.
1
@Joe
Your comment made me ill. Sorry to say. I know you mean no harm. But no - I have no respect for the hustler.
3
It pains me to say this, because I believe to my bones in the value of the Fourth Estate. In an article describing the the institutions which have failed the American taxpayer, the New York Times shares part of the blame.
Donald Trump’s ties to international organized crime were no secret to the movers and shakers in New York City. This story should have appeared BEFORE the election. I certainly did not understand the extent of this systemic rot, and NYT readers certainly never read about it here.
Instead, we got hundreds of stories about Hilary’s e-mails, and an assurance that the one story about communication between Russia and Trump campaign was an error that should never have been published. I am not a big Hilary fan, but in hindsight, NYT editorial choices have left me bewildered.
Thank you for publishing it now, at least. It is an excellent article.
26
@Ginger M.
See the link after 3rd graph in the article. This article is adapted from David Enrich’s upcoming book.
5
It sounds like a match made in heaven....Donald and Deutsche Bank...in bed together through thick and thin. Donald is a laughing stock of the world save for the tyrants who approve of his methods and the tyrants he seeks to emulate. Heaven help us!
6
Caveat emptor. Do beware.
It's all about the money.
Just think Wells Fargo. Standard fare.
All banks do cheat. Not funny.
Deutsche Bank. Once proud and tall.
Now suspect. Join the crowd.
Is Deutsche German? It's your call.
By Mammon it is cowed.
2
Anthony Kennedy's son. Got it. Wondered what the connection was. The OLD BOY'S NETWORK never fails. Swampy..
14
we will be watching the unbelievable depth of this tragedy for the next 10 years, even after he is out of office it will be unfolding for years to come. these enablers can run but they can not hide.
6
@Kim
they are all being stalked by suicide...
8
This week the Senate will vote to refuse removal of Trump from office. His financial chicanery is not at issue, of course, except that it is in the form of his modus operandi.
Trump sells a public facing image of the ultimate business guru. He even started a university to spread his special deal making sauce. This article points out how captors that image is.
At the end of the day, Trump is nothing more than an amplified P.T. Barnum. He is exaggerated by the noise coming out of his own mouth but wouldn't get anywhere without his right-wing "media" machine.
This mess is beyond infusing. It is time to fight back with the only tool we have; our purchasing power. Boycott Fox advertisers, Trump loyalists, and Trump businesses. It's time to shut off their spigot.
10
The New Yorker wrote about all this last year. Crickets among the people who matter.
10
The article is interesting and this is something. An international bank like Deutsche Bank has become the star of the financial world. This will go back to last century that the Roman Empire was printing money in sheets of paper to invest ancient projects.
This is another reason I don't either trust or vote for President Donald Trump.
2
it has always been and always will be about the Benjamins.
2
Unless I were a criminal, why would I want to work with Deutsche Bank?
7
Now that Justice Kennedy’s name has been invoked, I would think it be behoove him to confirm or deny the allegations to clear his name.
10
Democracy is dead.
5
This whale of a story needed to run weeks ago when it might have had a bigger impact. I hope it has legs.
Is it just coincidence that it is released the day after the Iowa caucuses, on the night of the SOTU speech, and on the eve of the Senate impeachment vote?
Now it gets further buried in the chaos of the Iowa caucus debacle. Wake up MSNBC & CNN! Instead of having your reporters chasing Iowa caucus goers last night, you should be running down this story.
13
@Vicki ...it did. NYT did a very similiar deep dive on trumps money about a month or 2,3 ago. I thought it was a rerun, but turned out to be a bit different.
what will it take to put this criminal in jail
5
Which one(s)?
3
This reads like a the Italian Mafia in the great USA....and I, an American, thought that the Deutsche Bank was as clean as the top of its highest mountain in the Bavarian Alps. Whoa there...glad that my 'small change' is in the next best thing to 'under the mattress'....a small personal savings bank.
6
@Pauline Hartwig The Italian Mafia? So 60's or 70's. Now we have to deal with the Post-Soviet Information Technology Mafia. Russia is a negligible entity in computer hardware but in software-malware its reigns supreme. All this with an economy barely the size of Italy and a population more than double. DB's malfeasance is really based on this superiority particularly money laundering. Think of all these luxurious Manhattan pencil-like skyscapers whose splendid apartments stay for a large part unoccupied most of the year and belong to the tenth degree to some mysterious Cayman Islands entity .
8
@Castanea Sativa
The Russian soul is so plagued by inferiority complexes, that it - quite like the Joker - needs to destroy everything it deems superior to it.
When the talk gets around to who could beat Trump in a debate, my choice is Bloomberg. Not a lot around the topic of finance would get past Bloomberg, and everybody knows it. Trump's voters are probably aware of his shaky financial history but like the Senate are just dishonest enough not to care. Bloomberg is probably aware of Trump's cushion and could recite what this article provides. Also, Bloomberg would probably be a trustworthy custodian of our national Economy, he may even try Demand Side tax breaks which always have been the honest course to take where lubricating the economy where it'd actually work instead of being how republicans finance their campaigns for the bounce back to their laps from fat cats who, as we all know were laundered a disproportionate slice of that Crime. I for one would enjoy watching Trump crumble under the challenge from an actual expert in high finance.
16
@Ratza Fratza
Great comment. But I don’t think Trump will debate any candidate. He doesn’t have to and he’d most likely lose any debate in which he engaged. And he knows it, so sitting tight and refusing to debate is, IMHO, the likeliest course he’ll take.
9
This is pure madness; bending, breaking and twisting the rules and then get away with it, that’s great. But seriously, if you think about it, by acting like this, as it proves, you can get extremely wealthy and become the president of the US. Isn’t this the American dream?
And the FBI and all other agencies, prosecutors and Democrats they cannot build a case against him, that’s totally crazy and unbelievable. For the moment it looks like it and this means nobody will be able to beat Trump and for sure he will be reelected. Good luck America ( and ROW ).
8
Anyone actually surprised by the reporting?
11
Hardworking people can't get loans but sleazebag con artists are welcome to feed at the trough.
12
@Vinson ... Yep. That about sums it up.
When looking into Deutschland Bank, you also need to look at a REIT called Ladder Capital Group.
Ladder Capital Executive Director on the originations team, Jack Weisselberg is the son of Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg.
11
It’s so clear - they are all laundering prostitution and blackmail ring money as well as stolen Russian money via extortion, racketeering, misappropriation of Russian Federation’s government assets, oil sales via Saudi Arabia and arms sales as well.. Trump just inserted himself into this circle while investing his dad’s fortune into creating an appearance of legitimate business dealings.
11
It’s really not complicated, albeit tragic and dangerous. Trump needed money badly. Deutsche Bank was intermediary between vast amounts of Russian and Saudi money. Russians and Saudi Arabians obviously expect/demand a return on their investment in Trump. Trump is delivering and American executive, legislative and judicial democratic institutions are apparently insufficient to stop him. An informed electorate and fair elections in 2020 could end this nightmare. I’m not yet confident in either.
25
@Concerned MD
Right. Fox News and newly minted Medal of Freedom recipient Rush Limbaugh aren't information sources.
3
Look at the NYT headlines after Trump's SOTU. This was a terrible address, full of lies and exaggerations and they normalised it. No wonder no one takes anything seriously. I think it is better to either not report it or report it more modestly than to put up stuff that is as bad as Trump's ego boasting.
10
"...If he [Trump (my edit)] secretly got money from the Kremlin, Deutsche Bank would probably know..." [op cit]
--
So then, the people at Deutsche Bank might actually have an idea, of whether or not Donald Trump ["DJT"] is or is not, "personally indebted to Vladimir Putin." [my caption]
--
If their answer is, "yes," then that would make DJT, "Putin's Puppet" [my caption], and explain why our President appears to take so many of his cues from the Kremlin--that is, why he is acting wholly or in part in the interest of Russia, in domestic as well as in foreign affairs.
--
I don't think this is what Americans want, for "Four-More-Years!" [my quote]
--
Don't you think it's time for our Government to have a real good look at this?
6
Please, please, do everything you can to vote this crook, this conman, out in November. For your country and the rest of us.
7
Of Ken Starr went after the Clintons over a failed real estate deal, why is no special prosecutor assigned to this mafia style money laundering scheme?
12
Richard Nixon had to proclaim "I am not a crook." Donald Trump is more like 'You are not a crook? More fool you, more for me.'
Republicans, who held their nose to vote for Trump, are now enthralled. One told me 'Trump's playing the system for his benefit shows he's smarter than we are and makes him a great president.'
Bilking government is the Trump family business. Fred Trump was hauled before Congress, for windfall profiteering on wartime government contracts. Donald wears his bankruptcies as badges of honor, his family is profiteering on the presidency, and the GOP is grooming DonJr as heir apparent.
While 'the opposition' is busy forming its purity test circular shooting squad. Again.
6
Trump’s signature is frightening. But so is he. And corrupt, a criminal. God help us.
5
Birds of a feather sink together - and they will both sink. DJT will himself become and destitute and DB will have to declare bankruptcy loan defaults by risky creditors like DJT, fake businesses and certain 3rd world countries.
3
@BJM ...we can only hope. From your lips to God's ears.
1
The story recapsulates what is already in the records more or less. It does not reveal how Trump precisely interacted with the buyers of his condos. There is the story of this mansion in Florida with a 100% surcharge to a Russian oligarch, there are his many tenants of shady quality in his NY appartments. But so far no direct evidence of the alleged laundro-mat scheme has been put forward. How did he pay for his scotish golf courses? Are his loans from DB being backed-up and underwritten by third parties? Where is the smoking gun?
5
I didn't watch the State of the Union. Didn't t want to get sick to my stomach.
3
“House of Cards” is a fascinatingly rich English language expression ably morphed into the title of a clever British novel later converted into a sardonic BBC 3 part mini-series, and THEN terminally transported into an overly produced baroque shambles (on many levels) of an impenetrable American streamshow.
2008 reminds us of what 1929 reminded us and which is something we still have no way of “dealing” - except to keep on dealing: our financial system is ultimately a House of Cards. And citizen trimp is teaching (reminding?) us that constitutional democracy is also, in part, a shaky and flimsy structure sustained only by faith and care.
But keep dealing we must whether or not trimp and his cronies at Dueutsche (and other parts of the underworld) ever spend any well earned respites in a Federal slammer.
3
This article does not indicate any direct involvement of Russian money in Trump's DB's loans. Indirect maybe through buying (overpriced) condos, and financing his down payment. Question is, was he doing deals not through DB?
1
Trump provided the flights, Epstein provided the entertainment. Deutsch Bank provided you the money laundering. I think the connection between Epstein and Trump was friendship and Business Partnership. The unknowing bankers, politicians, businessmen and royal family members who were flown to Mar -A-Lago as guest of Trump, thought they were partying and having consensual sex with young adult women. They later found out they committed felony sexual assault of a minor and the games began.
Far too many of our politicians, business leaders, and judges have for too long allowed this guy to go unchecked. There was a reason so many of them hated him but allowed him to have his way. There is a reason bankers at Deutsche bank, who accepted these trips to Mar A Lago, overlooked their own common sense and continued to loan Trump millions even though he was constantly defaulting on his loans with their bank. I mean what bank loans a guy $40 million dollars to pay off another loan that he is about to default on at the bank. It just defies logic. Unfortunately, the only other person who knew the game committed suicide inside of a prison.
6
And with these players what makes you think it was suicide?
3
First, thank you for excellent investigative journalism. Keep on. And secondly, would the NYT consider devoting a series on Trump’s and others economic self-dealings throughout this “election” cycle?
6
@Rita Addessa
Check out the podcast "Trump Inc".
"In terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets,"
Donald Trump Jr., 2008
5
If Deutsche Bank was a person they’d be in jail.
3
Will any of these details ever be revealed? Will we ever see the criminality in Trump's business behavior? How does a bankrupt guy pay off 2 billion dollars worth of debt? Where did that money come from? WHY ISN'T ANYONE INVESTIGATING THE REAL QUESTIONS???
OH BUT HER EMAIL . . .
5
The most interesting tidbit in this fascinating article is the line Trump has into former Justice Anthony Kennedy. Kennedy's son Justin worked for Mnuchin at Goldman Sachs. Kennedy's son Justin then got deeply involved in Trump's business deals, including very sketchy ones, at Deutsche Bank and was one of DJT's key contact as this dirty bank.
This goes a long way to explain Justice Kennedy's weird willingness to voluntarily step down from the Supreme Court and trust the untrustworthy Trump to make an appropriate Supreme Court pick. That in turn led to the debacle of Trump's putting forward as a candidate a radical right-wing judicial activist (who also btw was an accused sexual assailant and an accused perjurer). This is the back story on how we got Brett Kavanaugh on the Court in Kennedy's place.
It all goes back to a personal and (dubious) business relationship between Trump and Justice Kennedy's son.
9
This article is more disturbing than anything I've seen on "American Greed."
5
I think DT owes billions to Putin's mob. When DT and Vlad have secret meetings, Putin asks for repayment, DT doesn't have it, so Putin settles for Top Secret U.S. information.
8
@Bill W
That is the life of a Russian asset.
3
We've been sold.
8
@Travis ` ... True. I'm satisfied with a simple life at the bottom with a few bucks in my pocket to get by. It's the best we can do.
It all sounds like a bad novel full of exaggerated Gordon Gekkos. Yet it's true. Teddy Roosevelt and Franklin Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower warned us.
You still think Elizabeth Warren or Bernie sanders are too extreme after reading this ?
6
Keep this article on the front page until Trump is out of office. Keep the comments section open until he is out of office. We need to censure him if the Congress won't do so...
7
Let's see what happen on the pending cases at the SC. Cheating Trump's organized crimes could hardly be traced through ordinary analysis.
Even Speaker Pelosi. Chairmen Schiff, Adler and the Democrat leaders failed to break the evil cover-ups by the GOP traitors, including Cheating Trump himself.
Could we trust the SC?
One thing is certain: the willof the patriotic Americans to defend our Great Nation and the rule of laws. The Super Crooked outlaws should be punished.
2
"Hey, Donnie, do me a favor." Vladimir Putin knows how Donald Trump got bailed out. This is a much bigger quid pro quo scandal, only this time, Donald is the victim, not the Ukrainian premier. Donald Trump is forced to be in cahoots with the enemy and poses the greatest threat to our national security. What other incriminating secrets are locked up with the Ukraine telephone calls?
4
Russia helped us elect a president who lives on borrowed time. In the end, the poor will pay for his corrupt, egotistical, unbridled, insatiable and clearly impartial desires.
2
I heard Deutsche bank is up for the next Medal of Freedom.....
3
@Billy
DB will be handling social security funds once the Republicans privatize it. The maneuver will be branded "protection."
1
The money behind the Biden’s is US taxpayer money. Same with other Democrats. Warren made her millions as a “bankruptcy consultant” for fortune 250 companies after helping rewrite the federal bankruptcy laws in the 1990’s. I can give example after example. Don’t forget the Clintons, a fake charity organization that pays out less than 5% a year setup in Canada where it can’t be audited.
1
@JOSEPH
Even if all this were true, why would it justify what Trump has done? Have Republicans completely dismissed the ideas of honesty and ethics?
It certainly seems so, since the only justifications for Trump's behavior boil down to "if other people do something bad (or we pretend hard enough that they did), it means were are allowed to do whatever we want."
1
@JOSEPH
Documentation is important. Just making a claim, or repeating it as you are, doesn't make it true. I'm sure you could parrot "examples" all day but until your assertions are documented, all you have is conspiracy theory nonsense. Running with that will leave you highly confused because you'll always be two steps behind reality. You're asleep in the right-wing fake reality matrix, Neo.
@JOSEPH
[citation needed] for the CF info
Always a another hit job to prime for release whenever the Trump approval rating goes up.
Just another anti American dagger to Trump’s back to insure chaos and destruction of our capitalist system which has lifted more folks out of poverty than any other system.
This is not a critique of Capitalism it is a critique of corruption and the ethical bankruptcy of our president. The chaos in our society is being sewn by his words, his hate, his lies, and his manipulation of the truth. We have a ConMan for a president who behaves like a dictator, and his followers are too blind to recognize that their Dear Leader is the most un-American president we have ever had, destroying our rule of law, destroying our democracy, destroying the fabric of what really makes America great. He makes you believe that he’s got your back when he tears the systems down, refuses to be held and accountable for illegal actions, and creates enemies out of people who love this country so desperately they’ll put themselves in front of his fast moving train in order to uphold our democratic principles and our constitution. He models his government after a Russian oligarchy, not the beautiful democratic capitalist system that has made our country great. He’s a man of the 80s who wants to party hard now and let you pay for it later.
4
@Unhappy JD
How is this a hit piece? There are article links going back a year or so.
I see your comment as an ad hominem attack. Off be more impressed with a discussion of facts.
Trump is a product of New York City Real estate and reality television and money . Add all these up and you enter a world that has no basis in reality . But Trump is not a robot and he is not immortal . He is not a king and he is not a god . He is a finite creature .
He is actually a great example of egotism and vanity and falsehood run amuck . He is the example of everything we should avoid and turn away from if we want to be truly good people . God has given us an example in Trump of what not TO BE!!!!
6
Why is this surprising to anyone? We all read of his problems and deceptions in the late 80's and early 90's....His television game show illustrated what a clown(, huckster, buffoon,) he was. I thought the Times ran a piece back then with one of the five banks he was leveraged out to saying they couldn't afford to call in his loans as all five would be damaged beyond repair.
Blame this on the RNC's lack of vetting (did they see his financials?) Vote please, remember this when your senator is on the ballot....Especially if you live in Kentucky
6
An outstanding piece of reporting that opens an inside view of life at Deutsche Bank and its relationship with Trump.
It highlights the corruption and lack of integrity associated with Trump World before and during the presidency. I can only imagine what will happen when his tax returns become public, open for the world to see that we have a president who is the greatest conman in history.
The books and movies about this period of American history will go on for decades as the relationships with the Russians, Deutsche Bank, and elsewhere are slowly untangled and fed to the American public. It's part moral corruption, part hutzpah, and part demonic genius that holds this nation on edge as we enter the 2020 elections.
The sad part, and quite unbelievable for most of us, is how the Republican Members of the US Senate have lost their moral code while supporting Trump in his quest for greed and power. We are witnessing the decline of a once great nation, starting around the days of Reagan. It's like witnessing the last days of Nero and Rome all over again.
5
A friend graduated from high school in Pforzheim, Germany, an industrial city of about 100,000 in the west near the French border. She recently heard from a high school friend that her husband was in banking, had gotten involved with Russian mob money and jumped in front of a train. The friend was going underground to avoid the Russians who she figured would be looking for her to find out what she knew. Russian money is probably everywhere throughout the European banking system (they have given money to the French right wing also I believe), and they play for keeps.
Possibly the biggest danger with Trump apart from his unstable psyche is that any deviation from Putin's line could result in a document or two being dumped on the internet to let the mark know that he is close to being ruined, thus bringing him back in line. Probably same threat from Saudis, maybe also Netanyahu.
5
@slangpdx
Exactly right. He is a national security threat.
3
I hate to say it but I always thought it odd that Justice Kennedy should just up and retire. at the risk of being accused of conspiracy theories I would be surprised if Trumps relationship with Kennedy's son had something to do with it.
5
So Anthony Kennedy has much to be proud of: the shaky ethics of his biological son and declared partisanship of his successor on the Supreme Court. That's quite a legacy.
8
The story shows how credit ratings don't apply to the super rich. I have probably a better credit score than Trump but is any bank gojng to loan me money at way below market rates?
The system is rigged.
7
Former Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy? His son, an employee of Deutsche Bank, worked with on Trump's holdings and loan applications.
It all smelled fishy when Justice Kennedy retired and there was little press about his son.
What went on? Was there a quid pro quo between Trump and the Justice?
Did the Justice retired to save his son? And look at his replacement on the bench. Who's investigating?
4
"The bankers also talked about Trump’s well-documented ties to the organized-crime world ". And we do not even have the courage and strength to get rid of this guy on the contrary. Bernie Madoff is lonely and needs company...
3
After reading this I feel helpless, exhausted and deflated. We need a “hero,” and I see only the following presidential candidates who may rise to the occasion: Klobuchar, Bloomberg, Buttigieg, maybe Warren, Possibly Biden if he can prove himself, and Sanders if he center himself (convincingly), or all the above, in some roll or another in the cabinet. In the meantime, let’s hope the rest of the “great and the good” among us will help further their cause. So much depends upon it.
1
And of course the fact that Justin Kennedy was one of the stable genius’ bankers had nothing to do with influencing his father, the justice, to retire from the Supreme Court? It just seems too much of a coincidence that the justice retired so that the stable genius could nominate another conservative to the Court. I said it before and I’ll say it again, this needs to be investigated.
15
Everything is hugely perfect. We all can pay off one loan with another loan at better terms from the same bank. Hugely perfect. Exaggerating values is nothing new. Everybody does it, hugely.
Trump is a hugely great businessman, hugely.
Well, none of these bankers would do an illegal action with Trump. He wouldn't stand for it. Look at his campaigners who are hugely honest: Paul Manafort and his deputy, Rick Gates, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and a handful of lesser lights are hugely representative of Trump's honesty.
24
Justice Kennedy abruptly resigned from the Supreme Court handing Trump a pick to stack a right-wing majority who will protect and acquit his crimes. What does Trump know about Kennedy’s son? Enabling Deutsche Bank’s worst double dealings for so many years, Justin Kennedy most certainly has enough dirt on his hands to send him to prison for a long time. The same way Trump has targeted Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, in order to derail his campaign, Trump, needing Kavanaugh on bench, forced his hand on Justice Kennedy, blackmailing him to resign. In hindsight there’s irony in Trump’s description of Justin Kennedy. Now having Kavanaugh complete Trump’s securely stacked Supreme Court, Justin Kennedy is indeed to Trump a “Special Guy”!
40
Misleading illustration by Paul Sahre. Trump never leaves a paper trail and it’s not I.O.U. It’s I owe THEM.
10
Didn't Epstein also have a long relationship with Deutsche Bank? Of course they used Trump to launder Russian/Ukrainian loot.
13
I have always maintained that the guy blew his money a long time ago and supported his debauched and immoral lifestyle with loans from Russia, the Saudis, probably China chipped in some too. Plus he’s been laundering money through his heavily mortgaged properties!
34
If anyone thinks that the SCOTUS will allow Trump’s records from Deutsche Bank to ever see the light of day after Justice Kennedy’s son worked with Trump on these loans, they are mistaken. It was no coincidence that Justice Kennedy retired when he did. Chances are he saw this coming and he would have had to recuse himself anyway. And it’s very odd that around the same time this case was accepted by the SCOTUS, was when Bowers “hanged himself”.
33
Looks like Deutsche Bank is a criminal enterprise, just like the IMPEACHED so-called president's family business.
21
It's the gleeful shameless rapacity of it that's most disturbing. Trump loves this "game" as he calls it, meaning that he loves suckering believers and leaving a trail of wreckage. He needs victims.
The Republican voters are playing this dangerous game with him. If they think he's one of them, and that he owes them for their support, they're crazy.
23
Can someone please make a docu-series about this on Netflix already? That's the only way to get the general public to know any of this. Trump-base is not going to get past the title, but a gripping reality-drama is just the thing to pull this veil.
40
“The bank also furnished him with other services that have not previously been reported: providing sophisticated financial instruments that shielded him from risks and outside scrutiny...”
1)What are “sophisticated financial instruments” that shield from risk...”?
2) Can Congress not make it a law that candidates running for the presidency must reveal their foreign interests and tax returns?
3)It seems like some of this was out there prior to his election. Why does he continue to get a pass?
4) Are we going to allow Deutsche Bank to take us down with them? Or are they too corrupt to tangle with?
16
@Barbara
Congress will not and cannot make a law forcing candidates for the presidency to reveal their foreign interests and tax returns. Just ask the present senate. The house may pass such a law but it will rot on Mitch McConnell's desk. As for his tax returns - there already is a law requiring him to submit his tax returns to the oversight committee of the house. Of course the SCOUS is addressing trump's appeal and will probably declare that law unconstitutional. Thanks to the conservative pin heads sitting on the supreme court. Remember trump's speciality is bankruptcy. And with a trillion$ deficit we are well on the way.
3
Trump’s Byzantine relationship with this poorly run, unethical, and avaricious bank illustrates his high level of corruption. It reads like a confusing, chaotic, and comedic history of banking malfeasance and incompetence. It reflects Trump’s chaotic managerial
style as President in which he is unbound by any honesty or principles. It needs to be investigated with emphasis on finding the sources of Trump’s money which he used to repay his banking loans. I believe this likely comes from money laundered from Russian and Eastern European oligarchs, Arab tycoons, and criminal syndicates. Follow Trump’s money and you might find his connection with Putin. This would explain Trump’s strange admiration for the
tyrant and Putin’s interference in the past election for a man whom he has financial control of. This seems criminal and may border on treason.
24
So Russians, through Deutsche, financed Trump projects, taking a percentage of the payback. Then those Russians bought space in the Trump projects to assure their profitability. Russian money thus went through this process back to the oligarchs.
In other words, Trump was a money laundering vehicle for Russian oligarchs.
40
And another thing...if Justin Kennedy was involved in international money laundering schemes and Trump cronies knew about it, might that not explain his father's sudden decision to resign from the Supreme Court?
25
And meanwhile, Trump and Republicans establish rules to reduce the number of Americans eligible for food stamps, and Medicaid
23
this comment was published in Krugman's article today, but is apropos to this article
'the real 850lb zombie in the room is the mindset that can provide a seemingly logical rationalization for any behavior, speech, or happenstance that will be accepted by those who have been conditioned to believe that anything that can be narrated is as good or better as an actuality - the fantastical has eaten the actual'
11
So how did they skirt Sarbanes Oxley and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act? Perhaps you could visit some Business Ethics classes at our top MBA schools, too.
8
All I can say is if I were a loan officer and asked to approve a loan from someone who signed documents that looked like DJT's signature, I'd be running for the door!
10
When will someone, anyone, any nation, show Mr. Trump some "tough love"? The time is long overdue.
12
A Swindler, without conscience or remorse. Trump's 'sales pitch' plays to the ego of his creditor. When the scheme fails, as they all do, Trump again plays to their ego, only this time convincing them that if they do not settle for what he has offered they will lose everything they are owed, along with their reputation - their worst nightmare. It's like a dark comedy that Trump is now President, and he still gets everything done the same way - lies and fear.
18
@DjStJames
You can blame his presidency to the incredible stupidity and gullibility of the American electorate.
1
Very good story. I bet the book is much better. I´m gonna look for it and buy it,,
6
Wonder why the “greatest crime-fighting Mayor of NYC” didn’t work harder to root out this corruption?
17
Most unfortunate.We will have to wait and see the ruling from SCOTUS.
1
@Liber
He said in SOTU speech that he has a pipeline of judges waiting in the wings. Most convenient?
2
When you’re a “billionaire” who owes far more than the sum of your assets to a lender, you’re not a billionaire—you’re in debt.
17
Trump stiffed his trades people, lawyers...which is why he ended up with such dregs of lawyers, and many, many condominium buyers. He presold units which were never built.
11
Great investigative journalism.
Worst possible time to publish it.
Waiting just three more days would have given this piece so much more weight in the news cycle.
9
@JD
It’s in the Sunday magazine section, so seems it’s out a bit early before the weekend.
1
The Russians and Saudis OWN Trump. No wonder he kowtows to them constantly.
21
There is so much here that is disgusting - and it doesn't even get into the details of money laundering for Russian oligarchs.
And how did Justice Kennedy get away with not recusing himself from any cases having to do with Trump?
16
@MKlik
Didn't you know that these conservative members of SCOTUS are rotten to the core? What we need is a revolution to get rid of these corrupt senators who continue to confirm these worthless justices.
1
This type of banking mess is paid for by taxpayers of many nations some of them very poor. It is disgusting that no government is on top of this especially the German government. We are being robbed.
10
Bush & Cheney falsely instigated the Iraq war, trillions of dollars and unimaginable death and destruction, also at the helm of the 2008 financial collapse.They say history will judge, ya think ? We the People neglected our individual responsibilities , maybe We are the ones that our children will judge.
11
Everything and everyone mentioned in this article seems disgusting, dishonest, and disastrous. It is a house of cards in a weather forecast of a hurricane. Only Elizabeth Warren of the Democratic presidential candidates even seems able to understand this mess and have a plan to clean it up. It all makes me embarrassed.
1075
@Lynn Ochberg It is a pity that members of the Republican Party’s “Senatorial Club” are incapable of feeling embarrassment or much of anything. Money has made zombies of them all.
95
@Lynn Ochberg
Bloomberg has the ability to understand this and he can do something about it, as on average he works well with people and isn't an ideologue. He's practical and can get stuff done. He shares with Warren the desire to fix this country and he's vowed to support the nominee, whoever it might be.
43
@Alive and Well
Maybe he'll prove to be another trump. Beware of wolf in sheep's clothing.
8
Dear Readers,
Tax Day, April 15, 2020 is on a Wednesday this year.
I urge you to wear red on April 15 to show that tens of millions of us file our taxes and that TRUMP blocks any and all attempts to release his taxes. He has robbed our nation in so many ways.
Put enormous pressure on this issue. It may be the best chance we have to expose this house of cards and finally pop his phony balloons.
16
No, sorry. Red has been banished from my wardrobe forever.
We are becoming Thailand: identified by the colors of our shirts and hats.
There are a number of sleazy business relationships mentioned here, but NOT what's really important. The real story is: Finding evidence of money laundering; doing business with known criminals and interactions with his handlers in Moscow. This what investigators and journalists have to focus on. We all know in our hart of harts, that with Trump, it's always much worse than what we can ever imagine, so keep digging!
15
The key to unraveling the Trump presidency is to unravel Deutsche Bank's dealings with Donald Trump and the Russian oligarchs who pulled him out of bankruptcy. Deep Throat's counsel to "Follow the Money" is as true now as it was then.
15
How is it that a single bank can get so big and reckless as to qualify as the 'most important net contributor to systemic risks' worldwide? Break it up now!
8
I have been in Commercial Banking for over 35 years and I can tell you that financial information for a borrower of this size does not disappear, unless someone wants it to. DB is covering up a massive crime.
38
The Republican spin on this sordid history would paint their hero as a great dealmaker, a tough operator whose invaluable experience in high finance enabled him to build America's great economy. It confirms for them that their leader is an economic wizard.
5
A key unanswered question:
What the article does not appear to explain was the source of the money the private banking unit was lending.
The commercial lending unit appears to be saying no, but the private banking unit was saying yes.
Whose money were they lending? Who were the private banking customers whose money was being loaned? The article hints that this unit was seeking wealthy American clients. By the time these loans were being made, who else was in their client list?
Whose money was being loaned?
15
This is interesting analysis but we're seeing info from before Trump got into politics.
It's enough to know that he had dealing with major banks, and may still have debt. Apart from that, what? If he was putting his debtors at risk in some way from his current position, sure that's something, or demanding special treatment from banks because of his position that's something. Is that occurring? I don't need to see relatively old news here, fascinating and it is.
1
A postscript, among many others, to this story - Justice Kennedy then negotiated (that's right, negotiated) with the Trump team to choose his successor, Brett Kavanaugh.
Watching the Senate weasel its way to acquitting this man last Friday, I thought to myself how completely Trump had corrupted all 3 branches of the Federal government. A few seconds later I realized the Republican party, with some help from the Clintonistas and Obamistas had already done the groundwork, Trump has just come and finished it and put it to work in his favor.
We need to reverse everything done in the name of the "War on Terror" and open up our government to more transparency. There is a heartbreaking article about the lack of funding for the National Archives, while we have been burning trillions of dollars in the name of military intervention and intelligence. Vladimir Putin seems to be able to manage to rule the world better with a fiftieth of our expenditure, we need to clean up our act.
Elizabeth Warren and Sanders have the right approach. The rest of them are obsessed with pleasing the "donor class". Oligarchies do not work well for anybody, including the top 1% who live more meager lives than the top 1% of progressive societies. An American billionaire is a lot more free and can enjoy their wealth better than a Third World billionaire, who has a fleet of Ferraris, but no decent roads or tracks to drive them in, and no competent mechanics or parts to maintain them with.
13
As an international banker, I discovered that the big german corporations, including Deutsche bank, had a quasi inexistant business deontology (internationally). This well documented article does not surprise me. But it took 20 years for Deutsche Bank to fail....and such a failure of our regulators should entice the electorate to empower people who understand the way the system works...Mrs Warren, here, being one of them. And as far as Trump is concerned, it could be of interest to describe also how Citibank during the early nineties prevented its bankruptcy .
32
I promised myself 'no more Trump comments' as nothing I say, or anyone for that matter, can add to what is so well known about a most exceptionally loathsome family. Surely, this whole saga, or dare I say the Trump era, will forever cause the editors of 'Ripley's Believe it or not' to shake their heads in wonder . . .
37
Where I come from you stiff a workingman, you get introduced to a Louisville slugger, should have happened to trump and Kushner many times.
86
@11b40 ... You are so right.
Biden? Burisma? A president motivated by anti-corruption?
"Trump moved down the line until he got to Anthony Kennedy. As Trump pumped the justice’s hand, Kennedy congratulated him on a successful speech. “Very nice, thank you,” Trump replied. “Say hello to your boy,” he added, patting the justice’s arm. “Special guy.”
Perfect!
45
@cwc
Kennedy's son had already left the 7 years before.
One positive of Trump election is that he has outed everyone associated with the Trump name. This level of depravity go down in history. So much so, that the Republican Party will need to change its name and the deniers will be pushed back to Mar a Largo - where the depravity began. It will add new meaning to the word Trumped!
30
Trump's buddy Pompeo has studied every war in history. He fills Trump in on things like Pearl Harbor. Dreams up wicked plans too.
4
Somebody puts their money in this bank — a function of the absurd amounts of fiat money generated by European central banks. The Trump balance sheet is probably not unlike those of some irresponsible nations.
7
Meanwhile, Trump's main enabler at Deutsche Bank , his "Personal Banker" who broke all the policies around risk management, and possibly helped wash some money with "Russian Oligarchs" still has her job at this damaged bank.
Why, unless I were a criminal, would I do any business with DB?
28
I prepared my taxes for 2019 today. Then I read this article and listened to the paltry statements by Republican senators in the criminal's impeachment odyssey.
Just more proof that he is above the law. He hangs with criminals and lives with no regrets. Also, has anyone really believed that Justice Kennedy decided to "retire"??
59
He paid it all back. That’s all that matters. Your journalistic efforts would be better spent with more interesting stories.
3
@Mike DeMaio
I'm sure he has no problem releasing his financial records then -- as he repeatedly promised prior to being elected -- right?
As a conservative, I'm sickened that so many people are so willing -- even eager -- to be lied to by someone just because there's an (R) next to his name.
This is how democracies fall.
19
@Mike DeMaio He paid back Russian money from the bank with money he got from Russians for space in the buildings. That's a pretty straightforward money laundering scheme.
And because the Russians know about this, they have him under their thumbs.
You may be comfortable with a president under the thumb of Putin. I am not.
22
@Mike DeMaio The problem is that we don't know how it was paid back, or if it was.
Just because Trump said something doesn't make is so, it actually makes it more likely to be a lie.
14
Impeachment failed and now we’re back to this?
5
@Arch Stanton, when Trump has reduced one of the world's most respected newspapers to a tabloid rag, that's power that's scary. Of course it was their own choice.
2
For the record Trump was impeached. Now if only his supporters can actually read s asnd analyze, rather than be too lazy or too consumed with supporting him, to understand what has happened really, not what is spun. With trump and his suttogates, including the now complicit GOP senate, it is all spin. ALL of it.
6
One day we will be able to see the level of money laundering and other fraudulent behavior that Trump engaged in with the help of Deutsche Bank. This is a criminal president and a criminal Bank.
33
Yep, he's such a good businessman.
6
It’s not “envelope-pushing” by Deutsche Bank; it’s law breaking.
24
@Not Pierre
Exactly which laws were broken?
This is what Republican senators are hiding. Hold the accountable and vote.
12
So what you're saying is that crime pays?
12
Now that CollusionGate and Impeachment and everything Dems have done to defeat the President have failed, we're back to hunting for financial improprieties.
2
Difference is that hunters wait for hunting season. Trump offers it year round.
As a reminder, these are criminal allegations, impeachment was political.
6
The fact that the Republicans are looking the other way doesn't mean that Trump isn't guilty. It just means that they're holding their own to a much lower standard than they hold Democrats.
8
@Dr. Reality Its been in the courts for over a year(whats he hiding?) and supremes looking at in in june.In the constitution congress can have them. That will be the silver bullit!
2
In this otherwise excellent article, this is a very misleading statement, “For its part, Deutsche Bank has pocketed tens of millions of dollars in fees and interest payments.” No. For its part Deutsche Bank has lost hundreds of millions of dollars from loaning money to Trump. That they’ve written those huge losses off, and recently made some small portion of that money back, does not over-ride the massive loan defaults Trump foisted on Deutsche Bank.
Trump inherited almost a half a billion dollars from his father, aided by tax evasion. He borrowed and defaulted on two to three billion dollars in loans from Deutsche Bank and others on Wall Street. He has laundered tens of millions to hundreds of millions of dollars from various mafiosi through shady real estate transactions. Trump has bilked contractors, employees and customers out of tens of millions to hundreds of millions of dollars. The man is a complete shyster and a fraud. This article, as bad as it sounds, doesn’t go nearly far enough in portraying Trump’s corruption and dishonesty. The full story needs to be told.
38
Ackerman just dumbly copied so called business l leaders in the US that invented the art of demanding idiotic profit levels and being absolutely slavish to quarterly earnings. Ruining companies and making dumb business deals that saddled their businesses with liabilities. (see Jack Welch and GE....GE is still trying to right the ship from the Welch legacy.) And Trump is nothing more than an oversized grifter, except when the ashes settle he wins. Banks lose, he doesn’t repay, they settle for much less, but he walks away owning the property. He’s not intelligent in any traditional sense but I have to admit he’s cunning. Overstating his assets is another part of the scheme. Like overvaluing your house if you plan to sell it. The only difference is with normal people the market will not be fooled by that. Apparently DB was happy to look the other way.
Think about how the US broke up the industrial trusts because they had become too large and potentially risky to the economy. Why do large banks today get a pass? They shouldn’t. But follow the money, to Washington.....
14
@Wilmington EDTsion ... And don't forget Welch saying on national tv that he would shoot Imelt if he had one more down quarter. Nice. These men worship at the altar of money.
This simply exhausts me beyond measure - exhausted from the corruption, exhausted that people constantly get away with it, exhausted that nothing ever bloody happens to any of these people. Exhausted.
42
Exhaustion. Exactly what they are counting on.
7
@SBFH Get used to exhaustion.Im a Trump hater but look at this field. Funny thing though, he gets impeached, all for an old man who finishes fourth in Iowa.Maybe Bloomberg.
4
@kevin d cox I agree Bloomberg is the only hope.
1
Absolutely unbelievable. From an uneducated Bronx teller to some of the most "sophisticated" financial people in the world - this is a gang that couldn't shoot straight.
And the worst of them - is now the President of the United States. And if his favorite lender -Deutsch Bank goes under, like Bear Stearns in 2008, it will drag down hundreds of world-wide banks with it. Trump will end up doing to the whole world what he used to only do locally in New York - go bankrupt but this time take everyone with him.
22
Late-stage capitalism is horrifying to behold.
20
@jrw
more horrifying is that "capitalism" is set up to hang on to the bitter end of human life on planet earth.
So, this is how the world really works? Money grabbing bankers rolling the dice with Trump. Just learned a lesson in the facts of life.
9
everyone in ny knows this.the old-guard iron- curtain military became the new-guard oligarchs. trump benefited from their new found-wealth via deutsche bank. that's how he got out of the hole he dug himself in during the late 80s and early 90s.
13
This piece of journalism reads more like an international spy novel. Unfortunately, it’s not James Bond at the center of the tale, but the President Of The United States, and a cast of self dealing, rule breaking, greedy con artists, disguised as bankers. And, of course Trump often lies to his bankers, in the same way he lies daily to both his avid supporters, his political enemies, and detractors. Over inflating the value of his assets to his bankers and dubbing himself a “stable genius” to Americans.
Apparently, pure dumb luck, has played an outsized role in Deutsche Bank’s recent growth, surprisingly easy skate through the 2008 financial crisis, and Trump’s success at extracting high risk loans from this maverick, high roller institution. Lurking in the background are mobsters and, not surprisingly, Russian oligarchs. All those chicken’s will probably come home to roost over the next few years, and unfortunately, Donald Trump’s, increasingly tarnished name will continue to appear in too many headlines.
13
You do kind of wonder, statistically, how many people and companies who surround themselves with corrupt people and companies end up being
corrupt themselves. In the real world, where 2 plus 2 equals 4, not the Trump world where 2 plus 2 equals whatever he wants and needs, there’s probably a strong connection.
5
How many Americans will read this article? Far too few, I'm guessing. It is sad and distressing that non-readers are so gullible. I read a Trump voter's comment yesterday: "I know he always has my back."
Trump doesn't have anybody's back. How can millions of American believe that he does?
21
That’s a difficult one to answer. We have a similar problem here in the UK with Brexit. Many of those who support Brexit may well have made their already dire situation even worse once the inevitable job losses kick in. And they think that our privileged prime minister, who is a multimillionaire, will lead them to sunlit uplands. It’s baffling - and worrying.
5
This article pairs well with the column about the Iraq debacle
by an army WMD investigator. They tell parallel stories,
happening at roughly the same time, of unlimited hubris, rapacious greed, the power that deludes, and the moral weakness that feeds upon and therefore needs delusion
for sustenance.
Unfortunately it appears far too late to do us any good. The vote tomorrow will occur with a preannounced result. We all
know what happens the day after, the day after that, etc.
By November its content will have been forgotten about or
completely squashed under an unending sequence of targeted streams of bile and vomit that will be heaved at us 24/7 by media buys that will cost billions to demonize opponents in order to convince weak, vacillating, unsure, anxious, scattered minds not to vote for a democrat.
There will be the usual murmurs of polite outrage, the shaking of heads, or the shrugging of shoulders, if that, by the enabler class, and life will try and go on.
One other thing to note is that the story of russian sourced laundering money through, or not through, the bank's financing seems missing. Was everything propped up
solely through DB without laundered money, or did DB need to use laundered funding to justify the financing?
And about those tax returns?? It'll never be too late for those
to surface....
11
A Deutsche Bank sit down to discuss finances with Trump could have used about a dozen fact checkers be present to sift through his lies.
Taking in money from one bank branch to pay off another branch sure sounds like a Ponzi scheme to me.
I wonder if Madoff and Trump ever talked, and if so, did one liar immediately recognize the another.
I look forward to the unraveling of his records when they are finally made public. (And it is not an if).
12
The illustration of DTrumps signature clearly shows the stabbing dagger like motions he uses. Not only to sign his name, but symbolic of all of his personal dealings.
8
All these people who voted for the “successful businessman” should read this. And they never will.
Over a billion dollars of defaults listed here, and he walked away scot free and into the White House on a pack of lies.
Sons of Supreme Court justices, etc, involved???
It’s not the end of the story and it won’t end well.
14
This whole article and not one mention about Anthony Kennedy's sudden retirement, though his son was Trump's personal banker (when no one else would give him loans) for years. There is too much coincidence there to be ignored, yet ignore it we have, for too long.
13
Still not even a millionaire.
Still not out of his debt to Deutsche Bank and putin.
Still paying women (currently, press sec'y grisham) to not talk.
And still NOT my president, nor my country's, nor ours.
9
I think the evangelicals are on to something. Truly, Trump is beloved by God. There's no other rational explanation for all of this. Freedom!!!
2
The timing couldn't be more perfect before today's State of the Union's address for this Bit-Map to the shadows of tRump's financial universe to be revealed...!
6
An earlier, more abbreviated version of Deutsche Bank's entanglement with Trump – especially the Chicago Tower condo loan/suit debacle appeared in the NYT earlier last year. I don't remember if the journalist was Enrich, but it probably was. Trump needs to go to jail, and so do the lawyers and bankers who fuel his fraudulent schemes and bankruptcy stiffs (are you listening Joe Biden? Warren told ya so!). Deutsche Bank has been fined so many times for laundering money, the slap on the wrist they receive for doing so is a joke. They should be prohibited from doing business in the United States. Talk about rigged systems favoring the crooked and wealthy against Main Street, USA: it's more than appalling. I wonder what Michael Cohen knows about all of this. Remember he talked about bank and insurance fraud on many of Trump's loan applications during his House testimony. Let's see those tax returns! Of course what's even more alarming, is that this just underscores the depth of corruption and tyranny occurring in the Republican dominated senate. Makes ya kind of wonder if any of them have investments with Trump. Crooks, traitors, and tyrants: today's GOP. Vote them out and hold them accountable!
12
After reading this article and knowing Trump likes to give nasty nick names to his opponents, I have one for Trump that happens to be true. " Don the Con" !
4
@Joan
um, yeah, how creative. as if people haven't been saying that for years.
1
@Joan
Mayor DeBlasio already tried that line.
1
Trump is running the country like he ran his companies. With other people's money and into the ground.
We can fix it in November.
Vote Blue, no matter who.
13
The information that Deutsche Bank, Trump's sugar daddy, is corrupt and engages in Russian moneylaundering, has been out in plain sight for some time. The New Yorker reported on this in depth repeatedly, even before the 2016 election. It's great that the NYTimes is featuring it again, but it's still below the fold. It is still the choice of Republicans and the great American public to choose not to know or regard the high rolling cheating going on.
They're too busy finding victims to blame and criminalizing other people's poverty to notice that they are being conned by a specialist in bankruptcy.
Trump is doing to the country what he did to all the businesses he destroyed during his lifetime. Yet the punters don't want to give up the flimflam, as long as they can feel proud to stick a finger in the eye of those they've been taught to hate.
This is dangerous. There is a nemesis on the way, though we will all suffer from the crimes of the few, the greedy, the powerful. It's called earth.
The planet has a way of bringing down its apex predators, and we're headed for a fall if we don't get wise to ourselves and start working together with humanity and compassion to solve our mutual problems.
8
The Republicans in Senate and House are doing the same thing to cover up Trump’s corrupt dealing with Ukraine, just as his financial links to Russian oligarchs – possible money laundering and tax dodges were covered up, just as Trump made illegal payments to cover up affair with pornstar before the 2016 election. This puts the lie to Republicans’ excuse that they don’t need to hear from more witnesses to conclude ‘yes he did it but not impeachable” and let voters decide. Except voters don’t have the information to make their choice.
“If he secretly got money from the Kremlin, ¬Deutsche Bank would probably know.” Don’t the American people have a right to know, as Nixon once said, “if their president is a crook?”
I particularly take note of this section: ”Trump’s well-¬documented ties to the organized-- crime world — he had done business with people in or affiliated with the mob in Atlantic City and New York — and the possibility that his real estate projects were laundromats for illicit funds from countries like Russia, where oligarchs were trying to get money out of the country. ‘Everyone in the real estate business was involved in ‘flight capital,’ ’ a top executive told me. But the loans looked profitable, the relationship felt valuable and the concerns went unheeded.”
Americans are okay with this?
7
I look forward to the Supreme Court decision on subpoenas for Deutsche Bank's Trump records -- but with great trepidation.
Chief Justice Roberts just showed himself to be a neutered man with no interest in justice (see sham impeachment trial in Senate over which he presided).
This is the Trump Effect: turns out most people in high places have something to hide. And they'll hide behind Trump's bloated obesity.
Now, rhetoric is ramping up around the Iowa caucus debacle that our voting system is rigged -- just in time for some serious shenanigans regarding the November 2020 vote.
Ever wonder why Putin has remained quiet? Because his deeply in debt lackey in the Oval Office is doing a fine job of dismantling our nation and its values.
This is going to get much, much worse, now that Trump thinks he can do anything he wants.
11
The New Yorker covered DB in 12/14/12, 8/29/16 and 2/1/17.
5
After reading the entire article you get to the final few paragraphs indicating the relationship was mutually beneficial to President Trump and shareholders of Deutsche Bank. No crimes committed, but some dabbling toward accusation.
Absolutely fantastic piece of journalism. I was hooked reading. I hope one day the truth of the matter is revealed but I fear it never will.
8
Sadly, with hundreds of millions of tax dollars being funneled to Trump properties every year Trump is in office, the American taxpayers are paying for this. Literally.
9
Having worked in financial services for 20+ years, I can tell you the article is totally believable. Trump merely exploited the banks greed and short-term focus.
Banks have lending limits to any given name - something that any regulator should have been able to find. Don't count on the lawyers to stop a bad deal - they were viewed to be there to enable what the business wanted to achieve, not ensure compliance with laws.
What it does not mention is that we need to put all of these risky activities back into partnerships with unlimited liability. Imagine if all of the participants could be sued (and their colleagues) for everything they own. Undoubtedly, risk management would become sexier.
4
To all of us out there who have a high Fico, a great credit report, never missed a payment but can't borrow a penny from the bank remember the Golden Rule. He who has the gold rules.
8
Excellent, riveting, scary and disgusting. Thank you for a great piece of reporting. Just wish more of this kind of investigation had come before 2016.
I have come to believe that business losses should not carry forward to subsequent years. Also, I think any company showing business losses in more than one in three years should lose all depreciation expenses taken over the previous 5 years. In addition, any tax credits of any kind given to such a business over the last 5 yrs would automatically and immediately convert to loan status and subject to seizure by the IRS.
I suspect these rules would rid the system, somewhat, of mafia behavior.
Taxpayers should not be asked to subsidize recklessness, incompetence and outright graft.
We need to pay attention, all of us, to the system we live in.
5
I've been hearing for years that the reason Trump will not release his taxes is because it will be discovered he engaged in money laundering. If this is the case, WHY haven't Democrats aggressively pursued getting his tax returns? Why does the issue of Trump's tax returns always seem to fall by the wayside?
3
@Tom Where have you been? Richard Neal, Ways and Means Comm Chair went to court after the Trump administration refused a request(constitutionally legal) for 10 years of returns.Working through the courts and Supremes answering in June. It is trying to keep abreast of such a corrupt President. Waiting with baited breath.
2
@kevin d cox
The Democrats never mention Trump's taxes. Nor do they use the term "money laundering." There has been so much chaos with the Trump Presidency, that Americans have already forgotten about Trump's taxes. Democrats need to remind Americans.
2
I worked at DB (in a risk management function) during some of this time period, and so much of this article rings true. My function was tiny, especially compared to the size of the same function these days. I left around the time it was being downsized even further, with around 1/3 or the staff being cut. The IT infrastructure ridiculous, and some of the work was still paper based, even into the 2010s. The bank was completely siloed
8
What most Americans don’t realize is that what we are seeing is the level of business ethics in America. Why do
You think no one cares? It is because all that you’re hearing is really fairly normal in real estate.
Why do you think there was no big outcry when trump sought to quash the rules forbidding penalties for bribes when doing business in foreign lands?
Because it’s already being done and has been done by companies( especially oil) for decades. Truth is there is almost no way to compete unless you do.
The point is, this is not outrageous to the business community. This is outrageous to us because we have never seen a president adhere to the low bar of business ethics that actually exists in our country.
4
After reading this article I can't see why Trump is so afraid to reveal his taxes: he did nothing illegal and the blame will only fall on those who finance him. Revelation would just show he is a braggart about how rich he is, which everyone knows anyway. The article also reveals that he has an uncanny ability to pinpoint people who are greedy for something (money, power, recognition, etc...) and manipulate them to his own benefit. It helps explain who Trump chooses as helpers and advisors and why they are so furious with him once they figure out how he is using them (and they get all the blame!). This is excellent reporting about very bad news and I it helps me remember why I read the New York Times.
6
This past summer I was listening to NPR. If I remember correctly, their guest was describing the 700+ Trump properties bought by unidentified Offshore companies. Who were the buyers? Where did the money come from for the transaction? Obviously, if we follow the money, there could be a wealth of information as to where the money came from...hazarding a guess that Deutsch funneled/laundered it through the offshore companies. I wish Mr Enrich would comment on this as to whether there is any validity to the correlation. Thanks.
5
What ever happened to that show on cable TV called American Greed? Seems like there are so many more episodes to film and distribute but it seems to be only in rerun form now. Maybe it is so common place that no body would even tune in now.
2
When I was pursuing an (ultimately useless) MBA in 2000, one of our case studies was Enron's disastrous Dabhol power plant in India. No one could foresee Enron's totally fraudulent implosion a year later.
So I wonder at what point future business students will be studying Trump's house of cards and wondering why his corruption wasn't more transparent to investors and voters earlier on.
5
The whole DB debacle seems like T has more-or-less abused the mismanagement and naivety of the bank. I somehow feel - and I cannot prove this - that there has been some arm-twisting going on in the background. Literally.
1
Not naivete, but greed.
3
It's so simple. Trump and the business entities he controls are notorious for not honoring financial obligations. Trump won't reveal is tax returns because those documents will show he has stiffed Uncle Sam. He bows to Russians because he knows they'll never accept a payment plan that allows him to pay cents on the dollar.
5
Thanks Trump,without you our tradition of enabling kleptocracies around the world to launder and hide their loot would be purring along without much attention Congress needs to triple or quadruple the amount of appropriations for the treasury to enforce our laws All the best banks are involved and it is as American as apple pie. To think it only involves Trump and the Russians is to be delusional at best
After the dump of the Fonseca documents for example what changed?
1
Even the proof that Trump is less rich than he claims, that he gets money from the Russians, that he is guilty of money-laundering, fraud and corruption, will not sway his fans away from him. That's the real puzzle. And of course the SC is not going to hold him accountable.
8
If Trump's political opponents want a back door to his tax returns, I propose a solution. It can start with those who are elected to federal office. Congress should pass a law that states that the President, Vice President, representatives and senators have to provide tax returns for the last seven years in order to run. As long as they are in office, they have to provide their tax return every year. In addition, it needs to be visible to the public. In that way revealing tax returns doesn't look like the political hit job it's seen as now.
Of course it's not constitutional, and there is no way in you-know-where that most members of Congress would ever support such legislation. But if Trump's opponents in the House and Senate think it's justified, then they should be held to the same standard.
1
There are more bank regulatory authorities than you can count.
They have been in existence for about a hundred years.
The IRS and the U.S. Attorney have been operational for a similar hundred years.
It is their job to be on the lookout for nefarious activity.
They have highly paid and highly credentialed people who do just that.
But these commenters seem to know more than they do.
4
It’s not what the governments experts know. It’s what they are permitted to investigate and act upon. I assume you understand why that is?
3
Well, it appears that Deutsche Bank has a wee incentive to keep records of its work with Trump hidden from view. What a remarkable stroke of fortune for them that Trump's tax returns have "disappeared."
13
The lesson I get from this illuminating and informative article is that the US needs to fire Trump in Nov 2020. I hope and pray this happens. And I am not a person who prays often!
22
@toom: We do not yet know whether God likes to be prayed at, is angered by it, or indifferent to it. Perhaps this election will provide clues.
So a Supreme Court justices son was involved in shady deals and possibly breaking laws to help out trump...and make a lot of money. no wonder Kennedy was eager to retire and reward trump with another SC seat. And that would be a very interesting investigation.
72
@Joe Rockbottom: All Trump deals are in the public interest.
@Joe Rockbottom: Tell that to the Corporal Klink in charge of the Justice Department.
8
Great reporting, thanks very much. A strategy of growth no matter what is not a responsible strategy for a bank. Such a strategy was the collective one for the whole banking industry in the US by 2008, and despite the reforms attempted since then, banks are right back at it. The Fed has pumped trillions in cash into the economy. Interest rates are low. The yield curve is flat. All that money has to go somewhere when business is not investing, so asset values are bid up, debt ratios are elevated, and overall systemic risk increases. There is a liquidity event lurking out there that will knock this house of financial cards over. There always is when risk and reward are mismanaged as they are now. Perhaps DB is it, if the German government stops propping up its favored zombie bank.
10
@Joe Smith: Bankers traditionally live on the margin between the interest rate they pay depositors and the interest rate they charge borrowers.
1
@Steve Bolger
That was true 30 years ago. Now it's all about laying off the credit risk thru syndication, and just making money on fees for underwriting, arranging & syndication.
Shocking but not surprising. The Deutsche Bank brand clearly stinks as badly of fraud and corruption as the Trump brand. So many banks, such as BoNY, have succumbed to illegality in their dealings with supposedly big-ticket white guys, and it looks like DB is carrying on where BoNY left off, by funnelling money to undeserving, high-risk autocrats and Russian moneylaunders.
24
Everything trump does is protect himself. Nothing will ever be done for the country. Ever. Of course, protecting the Fuhrer’s interests is in the direct interest of the country....
So here we are. The fox has the keys.
Good luck , America. He’s poison indeed.
26
After reading this article, many will say Good for Trump, and, vote for him. Most of his supporters will not read this article because Fox News and Breitbart will call this a conspiracy of the American "communists" or "socialists" who hate capitalism.
10
Trump supporters won’t readjust. Too long. Too many big words.
4
Trump’s modus operandi has always been by hook or crook- his “Trump university” to cheat kid’s’ tuition money, his “foundation” to cheat taxes, his G7 at Doral deal, his resorts to sell influence. Deutsche Bank gave Trump a vault of money and connections to do more of those unscrupulous cheating deals. If we did that, we would be imprisoned. The presidency is Trump’s get out of jail free card with the GOP as his parole officer.
18
Mr Enrich:
Nice work.
Can you please find out how many GOP PAC's bank at Deutche?
25
I see that for Deutsche Bank, as for the current occupant of the White House, the 1980s have never ended. A pity.
12
This is one of the two things that will bring this "person" down. People will allow themselves to be demagogued and lied to by someone they believe is rich, but even the most gullible among them will not allow it to be done by someone they know is actually in debt and poorer than they are. Or at least so one would hope at long last.
The other thing would be "A Face in the Crowd" moment where he is caught on tape saying what he actually thinks of people stupid enough to vote for him.
16
@slangpdx
I'd like to think you are right, but I don't think anything would stop this "person's" fans from voting for him. The American propaganda machine has been extremely effective. Racism and religion works for the followers, racism and money for the backers.
5
nothing new here, same set up players and it just doesn't matter, there will be no punishment at all. Tax evasion, bank fraud, etc...unless someone plans on doing something about all this, save ink, again we know all this, but to know no one will go to jail or whatever is just pathetic. Please, someone give me a silver lining to all this nonsense. Are they waiting for him to get out of office since he is untouchable there and then the lawsuits will fly, can anyone answer me that?
3
This newspaper published an excerpt of a Trump tax return where he takes a billion dollar tax loss for what his investors lost in his Atlantic City casinos.
13
As with every trump business story, the question is: Why?
Why would anyone want to be associated with a man with a worldwide reputation as a litigious fraudster? Why would anyone risk the reputation and fortune of a bank by lending to this serial and unrepentant bankrupt? I could also ask why anyone would vote for this morally repugnant, intellectually stunted, verminous creature, but I won't.
16
It’s still a good question. Let the rationalization ensue!
1
@andro: It's ripping off the corporation. The work of saints. Corporations are bad things.
@Steve Bolger He rips off more than corporations. He refused to pay the painters, plumbers and contractors who did work at his properties. Then he sued them Forcing them to take pennies on the dollars of what they were owed.
2
Deutsche Bank and Trump. Crooks who hang together! Forever partners in crime.
11
“Very nice, thank you,” Trump replied. “Say hello to your boy,” he added, patting the justice’s arm. “Special guy.”
Special guy indeed......
20
Majority of Americans: "the president is a provable criminal mobster and we're terrified"
Intelligence agencies, DOJ, DOD, State: "Yawn"
17
Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy's son finances Trump. Why isn't that the headline?
90
@Robert Bishop
And Kennedy’s protege sits on the Supreme Court.
Something so rotten is infecting every branch of this misbegotten administration.
15
Great investigative reporting.
Synopsis; When even the Russian mob (Putin) wouldn’t loan to Trump anymore, they liquidated Trump’s casinos and Deutche bank came to the rescue... with a catch; run for President to pay us all back. Russian oligarchs are too thinly veiled by Deutche bank. Trump had a 20 year tax write off for the casino loss to cover up the inflated securities which expired the year he ran for President. And Daddy isn’t there to keep the lights on anymore. So hello Russia? Are you listening?
But once again, the Russian dirt is merely a distraction compared to the Koch network’s meddling in our elections;
http://www.palastinvestigativefund.org/?StopThePurge2020
While everyone looks at Russia, if we don’t organize to stop the purge, the Koch network will steal yet another election for Trump right here under our noses so easily it will make Putin’s trolls on Fakebook look like nothing more than... well... trolls on Fakebook.
23
This could be nothing compared to what we will see now that the Senate has given carte blanche to POTUS to commit crimes
The US is on its way to becoming a failed state -- it sounds ridiculous and excessively dramatic but it's a viable scenario - Trump in 2020, Pence, Don Jr or Ivanka in 2024. All with a more-than-one-third Republican Senate. Twelve years is plenty of time to destroy and replace all the fundamental the mechanisms of government
26
Twelve tears was certainly long enough in a certain Western European country between 1933 and 1945.
2
@Winthrop Sneldrake
"Twelve years is plenty of time to destroy and replace all the fundamental the mechanisms of government"
Considering what he has accomplished in three years, I do not underestimate your concerns...
We need to wake up and fast.
3
@Winthrop Sneldrake: The US is a 50 state failure. It just doesn't know it yet.
4
What the article does not mention is that Deutsche was laundering billions for Russian oligarchs, which is why they wanted to see Trump succeed both economically and politically, having a vested interest in one another. Deutsche was sued for laundering money, not by the EU, but by the US. Two years ago, the bank was fined $14B, which is far more money than they ever made off DJT, and a pittance by comparison to their total profits. For that approach, rather than going to jail as Charles Keating did, you can thank Bill Barr, who during his first stint as AG, aggressively decided to only fine, rather than jail, white collar fraud. The word on that has been out for decades. (Ironic that Barr makes grandiose cultural speeches on morality!) They also failed one of the US stress tests. For all the grotesqueness of their financial arm in the US, their European arm was engaged in far worse fair, and the EU totally failed to do anything about it. So, thank you Germany, and the EU. If you don't like Trump, as many of us do not here, you have to only look in the mirror as to how he got to where he is, and why NATO is now facing a multi billion dollar bill. And how is ex-Deutsche CEO, Mr. Ackermann doing these days? He's on the Steering Committee of the influential Bilderberg Group, and part of the Group of 30 (G30) advising on International trade. Corruption of the culture indeed Mr. Barr.
49
@Mark "thank Bill Barr, who during his first stint as AG, aggressively decided to only fine, rather than jail, white collar fraud."
The Trump administration is not so generous with Huawei. They have asked Canada to arrest and extradite Meng Wanzhou for a somewhat dubious accusation of bank fraud. This has left Canada in the soup, but Trump declines to do anything to help. Meanwhile Trump has indicated that if China gives the right trade deal he will let Ms. Meng go.
Canadian farmers and two innocent imprisoned hostages in China are paying the price for Trumps subversion of justice.
11
@Mark
All of this activity took place while Obama was president and Hillary and Bill were accepting cash from Russian oligarchs.
Voters preferred the guy who profitted from the rigged system of paying off the politically well connected to the woman who profited by selling government influence.
Why is it that Obama didn't put any banking malfacters in jail but rather bailed them out? Why did Justice Kennedy vote with the Democrat block?
And this is why Justice Kennedy was suddenly forced to retire. Because of his son's relationship with Trump, he would have had to recuse himself from the upcoming Supreme Court cases, thereby increasing the possiblity of losing the arguments. It's always all about money.
Of course the Kremlin is involved. They own Trump and the Republicans.
52
@KB
Your theory makes no sense. SCOTUS judges don't have to recuse themselves from anything; the rules that apply to other judges do not apply to them. Even if they did, the relationship between Trump and Kennedy is so attenuated that those rules would not require recusal.
To me, this report highlights Deutsche Bank being a far worse bad actor than Trump. Trump sought business loans. It is Deutsche's duty to decline such requests. Parts of the analysis seem contradicting. On one hand, Trump seemly can't repay a 40 million personal guarantee meanwhile he's reconfigured his business model, generating million of dollars of income from branding and licensing. Trump suing Deutsche to challenge loan terms does not necessary constitute default. The article seems to assert default was inevitable without evidence. Like all major banks, Deutsche packages and sells complicated financial instruments which carve up and segregates risk associated with its loans. If Deutsche sells loans to bad actors, that is not Trump's decision. He's not calling the shots at Deutsche. Does this potentially harm America's interest--yes. Does America have sufficient safeguards to shelter such risk--probably not. Like most readers, I get it; there's a host of critical problems here. But creating a storyline that slants towards biased statements and projecting negative assumptions about Trump undercuts the strength of otherwise exceptional reporting. Like most entrepreneurs, Tump is opportunistic. He's leveraged a banking relationship to grow his business even when it would seem improbable for a bank to again loan him money. However, until specific evidence is laid out to the public by FBI, IRS, etc., it might be presumptuous to conclude Trump has violated the law.
3
@BRB
Your post is worthy of an editor pick.
It doesn't quite gel with my understanding.
You say "However, until specific evidence is laid out to the public by FBI, IRS, etc., it might be presumptuous to conclude Trump has violated the law".
Trump has successfully made his base suspicious of Government agencies. FBI, yes, maybe not the IRS, yet.
But, I am also suspicious of government agencies in the Trump regime to report malfeasance.
If Trump's financial records ever come to light, we citizens may finally get a view of the true story.
2
@GP Thank you for your comments and constructive criticism. I understand many Americans are losing faith in government agencies which have traditionally been viewed by most citizens as operating above political rhetoric. I hold some hope that most of the dedicated public servants still do. Truth doesn't always come quick or gentle.
3
This is the Republican's free market--- unregulated and crooks becoming multi-millionaires and billionaires. Let's hope our government after 2020 will start cleaning up but a huge majority of them (both Republicans and Democrats) are in the mega-millionaire class so what are the chances.
13
The Media is mostly too fearful for that straight ahead analysis.
They have friends in high places too.
2
"Trump, however, had a nasty tendency to stiff his business partners and associates. There was an extensive list of Trump contractors, vendors and lawyers who had to settle for a fraction of what they were owed after Trump threatened to pay nothing at all."
THIS.
I can't believe this wasn't shouted from the rafters during the 2016 race... the 'great businessman' who makes his money on the backs of the working class who entered into a contract only to be stiffed.
I live in Canada and have heard these stories for YEARS, and yet here we are.
40
They were. No one listened.
15
@George
It was shouted from the rooftops during 2016.
When Trump declared bankruptcy, it wasn't the working class who got stiffed. It was the uber wealthy to whom Deutshe Bank had sold high interest junk bonds. Hedge funds that wouldn't have paid income tax had they made winning bets. The big boys had to absorb the losses. Those same big boys that Obama bailed out when their bets faltered.
If Trump conned DB into lending him money, they conned their clients into buying the debt. He had a personal guarantee he was ostensibly defaulting on. They lent him money to repay them and sold the new debt to their clients.
3
The one part of the story that is missing here in the Chicago Tower is that how the forgiven amounts due on the loan should have been realized as income(gain) and taxed, but the Trump organization has skirted paying those taxes by declaring a loan to himself and parking the amount in perpetuity. When asked about it, Trump brushed off reporters and said so what it is a loan to myself. This house of cards only exists due to the IRS not having the resources to really audit financial spaghetti transactions. I am hopeful that whoever reaches the WH in 2021 will put teeth back into the IRS and move them to go after these duplicitous men, who preach trickle down, but live in trickle up economics.
26
@Russell Smith
You hypothesize with zero actual data. Have you seen his tax returns? No. Have Obama and the Obama IRS seen his tax returns? Yes. Are you really going to pretend that had there been a scintilla of even honest mistakes in Trump returns through 2015, the last returns available to Obama before the election, that Obama wouldn't have demanded a criminal trial by the Justice department.
Trump endorsed Hillary in 2008. Sid Blumenthal, Hillary's long time buddy, instigated the birther conspiracy and Trump jumped on the bandwagon.
Obama detested Trump and his FBI and Justice Department spied on Trump in an effort to prevent his election.
''Deutsche Bank lawyers told a federal court last year that the bank does not have those returns; it is unclear what happened to them.''
And I have a Casino in Atlantic City that's real successful I'd like to sell you.
22
@Lawrence
The Deutsche Bank copies of Trump's tax returns are in the same place as Hillary's emails detailing how the Clinton Foundation is paying for Chelsea's wedding.
Guess what? It is normal business records retention procedure to destroy records that are for tax years with closed audits.
It is illegal for the secretary of state to destroy documents that belong to the state department, to allow a pedophile access to classified data or use a personal server in order to defy FOIA requests.
1
Deutsche Bank was listed as the owner of some foreclosed homes I saw in my neighborhood during the Bush era recession.
8
@Kaari
Here in Hamilton County, Cincinnati, Ohio as well. Properties picked up for nothing, porch spindles and trim refreshed with the same buckets of white and burgundy paint and sold for astonishing amounts of money. Talk about quick bucks.
2
@Kaari
and your point is....?
A key line for me: Deutsche Bank introduced Trump to Russian investors in the late 90's. I'm sure these are the type of investors that you turn to when no one else is willing to invest in your deal; the type of investors you don't ever think about not repaying.
21
And who controls this bank? None other than Trump’s old pal Putin. That certainly would gain Trump’s attention and respect and restraint.The mystery is solved. A toast to Putin.
6
Here's the way it works:
Organized crime comes to a private banker with $100 million put together with drugs, dock thefts, prostitution, unlicensed gambling, counterfeit revenue stamps on liquor and tobacco products, etc. The banker washes the money by loaning it mostly to real estate developers who pay back $50 million. The crooks have $50 million they can spend "legitimately." The bankers collect interest and fees. The developer makes a bundle renting office or hotel space, or selling country club homes. Everyone is delighted. ("Hey! It was found money.")
Real estate developers laundering funny money? Built Vegas. Built Miami. Built Manhattan. Built San Francisco. And pretty much the entire wine industry in Cali.
15
Moral: always steal twice as much as you want, which is 10,000 tiles more than you need.
2
Good story, even with all the suppositions and guesswork. But like the Trump impeachment, it's good but no cigar. Indeed, it makes Trump look like a cleaver if somewhat unethical businessman, not the criminal conman that will eventually be exposed. No doubt the Trump administration is saying, "So What"?
2
When we get a Justice Department worthy of the title, all Deutsche Bank assets here should be frozen until they fully cooperate with investigations into Trump's finances.
13
If you made a documentary aobut this, the base would say it was fake news. But the fact remains, Trump has financial enablers and it's not his fault that unscrupulous bankers let him get away with it.
5
Brilliant piece of writing! This is the piece I've been waiting for, for a long time, explaining the link between Trump, Deutsche Bank, and Russian oligarchs.
If there's a key, and chilling, line it is this: “We just looked the other way,” a former executive explains. “That was the Deutsche Bank culture.”
Today, it's the Republican Senate that is looking the other way. The country will pay for this.
32
Fascinating! Good article!!
3
So Deutsche Bank is a world wide criminal money laundering operation that included Justice Kennedy's son.
What's anyone going to do about it?
16
Last resort??
Only resort would be accurate. For yours DB has been a link between putin oligarchs and trump, and now between putin oligarchs and the trump oligarchs (those who used to be known as the republican party).
9
Dear NYT:
Kindly widen this investigative reporting as to the role of one of fruits of Attorney General William Barr’s loins in helping Donald J. Trump secure a multi-million dollar loan from Deutsche Bank when even the neighborhood bodega would not lend him 25 cents.
Thanks.
An NYT paper and digital subscriber.
8
Character is obviously not a criterion at Deutsch Bank.
10
Not for the Presidency, apparently.
5
@Jungle Bee It is not a requirement at pretty much any bank... or corporation, for that matter. Character gets in the way.
His business acumen can best described as a marriage of Mr. Magoo and Roy Cohn.
14
Trump is obviously a fraudster. He lies, he cheats, he steals. Yep Trump is 100% unfit to be our President. I never thought I would live to see the Republican Party and it's elected officials stoop to the enablement of a criminal chief executive. Our GOP leaders have devolved into groveling sniveling avaricious fools. Vote 'em all out this November or we suffer the permanent loss of our democratic Republic.
21
As another great New Yorker once said, “You can see a lot just by looking.” And Democrats should have been looking into Trump’s questionable financial activities all along—especially anything involving the Russians—as key to their impeachment inquires. Instead, as real crimes go undetected, they have once again empowered him to boast how he has been vindicated, this time over a stupid political telephone controversy.
23
@Misterbianco: Trump and Pompeo are nitroglycerine together.
3
Democrats have been looking into Trump’s financials for almost three years, beginning the week they took over the House. Everything is tied up in court. Trump knows litigation can take years if you have the money to sustain it. All he needs is to be able to avoid accountability until after November, and the Supreme Court has ensured that the Deutsche Bank case won’t be heard until spring 2021.
13
@Misterbianco: They Democrats are just plain naive. Even Hillary.
2
This reminds me again of how annoyed I am at the failure of Congress to get Trump's tax records--which I understand should be available to the finance committee even without impeachment. My theory is that he has evaded taxes for years by rolling over real estate loses, but the money he lost was not his. If I am close to right, that would have been a much better basis for impeachment that the Ukraine thing. While I find that awful, many Americans can't understand it or don't care. Not paying taxes is something that any honest citizen would care about.
66
@rawebb1: Trump's refusal to divulge his finances should have put an immediate full stop to his campaign. There should be a scarlet letter for having voted for the scammer.
Everyone has conflicted interests. Very few can separate personal interest from public interests.
17
House Democrats have been suing to get Trump’s taxes for three years. It would be wonderful to have them, but it’s not for lack of trying. Blame complete and absolute obstruction of Congress, the second article of impeachment.
I disagree that the failure to pay taxes is a stronger case for impeachment than seeking foreign interference in an election. Abuse of power is the classic case for impeachment, exactly what the framers had in mind when they wrote impeachment into the Constitution. If Trump’s behavior in Ukraine isn’t impeachable, then nothing is.
Not incidentally, the Senate GOP vote has eliminated much of Article One, rendering congressional oversight meaningless. Apparently any president can refuse all document and witness requests from Congress on every investigation since contempt of Congress is no longer impeachable.
15
Evading taxes is a sport among rich Republicans. If you don’t believe me, spend a few moments in the bar, steam room, or locker room of a swanky, exclusive country club... if you’re of a type approved for admission .
4
You say that Deutsche Bank was by far Trump's biggest creditor.
We don't know this until we see the tax returns.
In the absence of these returns, we are free to assume what we want. I'll bet he owes more to various Russian people or entities than to DB.
Deutsche Bank's reputation is headed for the garbage disposal along with that of everyone else who has anything to do with Trump. He is poison. Everything Trump touches dies.
41
@Northpamet Except for his base thinks that by not paying taxes, it makes trump some kind of "smart."
1
@Northpamet
Tax returns don't show who your creditors are.
2
I'm wondering:
How did so many of this president's businesses fail?
20
Perhaps they were never meant to be profitable because they existed simply as a way to launder money.
10
@atutu,
Way more than his failed marriages and extra-marital affairs.
4
I share the same thoughts about DJT as most of the respondents do however , he’s been a crook for a long time and has no qualms about cheating and lying to extricate himself from responsibilities, Trumps strength, if one can call it that , is his ability to ALWAYS land on his feet . Personality? I hope him , Lindsay, Wilbur Ross , ‘Nuch ( I’m sure there’s more ) share the same wing in the “joint “ , it should be an interesting Pinochle game
21
This shows the most fundamental problem with our fragile financial structure: It is mostly based on sheer fantasy. Huge amounts of money are loaned with no assets backing them in case of default. Deutsche Bank had no leverage over Trump, because the loans had nothing behind them. I'd be interested to know how they were evaluated at the time by the rating agencies -- S&P and Moody's.
When a recession comes along, we pay. When people like Trump skate on taxes, we pay. It still costs real money to provide the goods and services we expect of our government. When those most able to pay don't, who's left?
62
@tic: People do not even understand the basic element of capitalism, which is fiat currency substantiated by a time value paid as interest. I look upon currencies that aren't even legal tender for all debts public and private and despair.
7
Great great article.Should win an award! I know that I know that they know that they know that they do not know.
6
My side is still splitting from reading that Deutsche Bank can't find Trump's tax returns.
43
How many Russian moles or agents work at Duetsche Bank?
Seems like the decisions were being made by people who were interested in something other than banking to me.
28
“Years later, it would become clear how Deutsche Bank pulled this off: by taking dangerous shortcuts and, at times, breaking the law.”
So.
Why is DB still in business?
Why is no one rotting away in jail?
38
It sounds like Trump is a two legged conflict of interest. It is almost as if Deutsche Bank financed him to the presidency without realizing how well he would work for them.
13
Excellent and well-researched article. The shame is that it won't make a bit of difference. Trump will simply sling insults at "the failing New York Times" on Twitter and continue to stonewall on the release of his tax returns. His supporters won't care one bit. They'll say it just shows how smart he is.
47
@Julie W. Twitter seems to be a substitute for all the birds going extinct.
7
A study in corruption and confirmation that we have "mob boss" running the country indebted to Putin. This will not end well for the Trump family when the democrats get in power with an attorney general willing to look into the convoluted finances of the Trump family.
32
What concerns me is that a long-time shady businessman now controls the government and those that could get to the bottom of his finances. My guess is they ain’t pretty!
23
So, this is "what we know". It is hard to believe that release of the bank's internal documents wouldn't present a trainload of jaw dropping practices, behaviors, and outright malfeasance. And, would these revelations provide any insight's to explain Eric Trump's quote: "Well, we don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia." Would release of the banks internal records connect these dots and what would they show.
One thing is certain.....Trump's relentless efforts to maintain these records sealed indicate they would not be exonerating.
Another point....Trump's overestimating of his financial worth would certainly support launching bank and insurance fraud investigations.
49
So, basically, any and all of Trump's business "seccess" comes from stiffing contracters, defaulting on loans and litigating to death. Well, he does have the advantage of not letting morals get in the way of greed.
70
Great reporting NYT! Everything Trump touches dies. Hopefully DB goes down with him. Scathing article on the morning of his State of the Union. Bankers are evil. Credit Unions all the way.
16
This is stellar reporting. Revelatory and damning in its content. Unfortunately, it clearly illustrates what we are up against with total capitalist control of our political system. Politicians and bankers doing services for each other, what could go wrong?
Who can stand up to forces like this when ordinary people don’t reject them and actually think someone like Donald Trump has their backs? This is the kind of reporting we need to have from now on until the danger of keeping the architects of such corruption sinks completely into the national psyche.
28
Where's Ivanka hiding her money?
46
How about some bullet-pointed highlights for those who don’t have the time to read the entire story?
8
Trump has no conscience and is the worst of the worst as is this bank.
10
And this is the "populist" president?
31
“The bankers also talked about Trump’s well-documented ties to the organized-crime world — he had done business with people in or affiliated with the mob in Atlantic City and New York — and the possibility that his real estate projects were laundromats for illicit funds from countries like Russia, where oligarchs were trying to get money out of the country.“
So the mobster and chief played with funds provided by Deutsche Bank and stiffed them on repayment. Now that Trump is president the spigot is open again. But this time instead of playing with money borrowed from banks and investors, he is gambling with tax payer funds appropriated by Congress.
37
@Sherry Wacker - Wilber Ross ran a Laundromat
at the Bank of Cyprus. That's why he can doze at
cabinet meetings.
8
Never knew why Kennedy retired so early. Now I know! How embarrassing to have to recuse himself and have his son's conduct revealed when the Court hears the various Trump finance cases.
53
the shame of all this is the needless delays in the investigation of every level of corruption. For example, justice Kennedy should have been exposed the day he abruptly retired, to be replaced through a corrupt set of hearings, led by a corrupt GOP senate, ending with the confirmation of a tainted and troubled kavenaugh. instead, the Dems said nothing and the media just reviewed Kennedy's mixed record.
21
Oh my, what a jigsaw puzzle this will be to finally put together - probably when Trump is out of office, when all those federal and state subpoenas are aimed at Trump as a private citizen. There are his infamous tax returns, Deutsche Bank carelessness and malfeasance, Russian mob money that was lent, Russian mob money that was laundered - and the uncut gem of this sad saga, Kennedy the son and Kennedy the father. Why do I sense that Justice Kennedy's exit was already in the cards prior to the election?
53
@Rick Morris
Here 's a scenario that I think Trump's playing with...if he returns to office...extending his "reign" longer than two terms.... ala his best pal Putin...
2
Don't forget how the feds took down Al Capone...income taxes.
27
@Deirdre Mack
That was before the Attorney General was crooked. Now the entire Republican party is complicit.
7
Trump and Deutsche Bank operate on hubris and greed. Grotesquely corrupt. Frivolously considered but massive bankruptcies, money laundering benefitting oligarchs, profoundly unethical deals: these unrepentant partners represent the worst financial practices in modern history.
15
Great article, thank you.
13
This article explains where the money went but not where it came from.
9
@Jim
Back in the nineties and long before "fake news" the major New York papers would all report that Trump was using his Real Estate business to launder money for the Russians...no legitimate New York brokers would go near him as he already was rumored to have ties to the Mafia. Sadly, like today, no one seemed to have the will or the ethics to stop him.
1
@Vas
No shock about the mob connection. Been waiting for someone to connect the story.
Trump always refers to his old pal Rudy as NYC’s greatest mayor, but before that he prosecuted the mob. I wonder if Rudy knew about this and if so, when did he know it?
1
Trump’s genius has always been getting the desperate and the greedy to believe he will sate their despair and greed. He manipulated a weak, corrupt, greedy institution for billions in loans and it taught him how to manipulate a weak, corrupt, greedy political party (and an outdated electoral system) for the presidency. None of it is ethical, though it’s not exactly illegal either.
Trump will always go for the weakest spots, the weakest people, because he knows can con them. Trump finds Americans at their weakest and burrows in.
But there have been plenty of people, banks, and institutions that see through Trump and have stopped him. He can be beaten, but only by those who see past their own greed.
There really wasn’t any doubt in 2016 but now it’s even clearer. Trump has used this country like he’s used everyone else in his life. This isn’t about making America better. It’s about fleecing the suckers. There are a lot of them apparently.
74
Nice that dots are being connected; such biz community issues which put the lie to Impeached Forever 45*'s acumen take too long to appear in print.
2
@R. Law: Fuguratively speaking, nothing can catch up with Trump now because he has broken through the legal speed of light.
4
And yet this criminal will be acquitted by the US Senate. Are there any honorable men and women left in America, or have they all been co-opted by this conman? American democracy is being flushed down the toilet, and its population and alleged governors don't care. Just grim to watch my homeland go so far down the wrong path.
26
Sordid. The “ perfect “ one word description of Trump and all his “ Business “ deals.
Seriously.
29
To paraphrase the old, "what did the president know and when did he know it" line for our time:
What info does Deutsche Bank have on Trump, and when did Putin get hold of it?
25
Great reporting. Still unanswered...does he owe the Oligarchs millions...or is it 10's of millions?
18
Obviously we don't need more of this in the White House! More reasons to vote blue, and get out of business conflicts! And once we pry the Trump syndicate out it is time to make the Emoluments Clause clear and airtight. I am still wondering about Anthony Kennedy's son as loan-maker and surprise resignation that gave us Kavanaugh. please investigate!
41
Great article! Shows how finance, banking and politics mixed with greed and giant egos lead to the demise of democracy and rise of an autocrat.
We are doomed...
13
David Corn and David Kay Johnston have reported about Trump's financial shenanigans for years.
Much of this has been reported before, including prior to the 2016 election.
The more times this is published, the larger the chance that more people will understand what a scammer Donald Trump really is.
68
He was less afraid of impeachment than having his taxes (true net worth) revealed.
This is one reason Bloomberg terrifies him too; he’s not just smarter than Trump, he’s a real billionaire.
61
Here's the thing that is not said in the article or spoken aloud in our culture - the bank wanted to do business with Trump because he was unscrupulous, and someone without a moral center is a valuable commodity. They know Trump would do whatever it takes to make sure he comes out on top and make money, and they knew his dirty deals would end up profiting them without getting their hands dirty.
America wants to think of itself as some sort of beacon of truth and justice but really we have devolved into a sewer where greed and avarice is lauded and respected. It's largely the success of the Republican Party which is financed by the wealthy for their benefit. The Right has made morally bankrupt people and corporations the heroes in our story by defining our lives and dreams and rights in terms of dollars. It is their mantra that we as a country spend too much on education, on the poor, on the sick, on the other. They preached "a businessman is what is needed to whip this country into profitability and responsibility." This county was never meant to be a business but the Right perverted us into thinking that was the truth.
The economy is only one aspect of whole of our land but it is the only aspect that matters to Trump and his followers. You cannot declare yourself "The Winner" or superior when you are looking to make other's lives better or seek justice for society or are attempting to give any child a shot at their dreams or instill respect of others among all.
51
@Lucas Lynch
And the republicans don the cloak of religion to persuade everyone that they are moral, despite a track record showing otherwise.
2
Thank you. I agree wholeheartedly with your words.
Great reporting! But the real question is, will this bounce off Trump again like The New York Times' outstanding reporting regarding his personal and property tax manipulations from last year? I predict something BIG is going to fall off the back of the turnip truck between now and election day. Keep up the good work, New York Times.
60
I wish my contemporary Rush Limbaugh a successful recovery from lung cancer so he can rail in full voice over the radio about how much it cost Medicare.
18
Doesn't look like anyone will lend to Trump anymore after his White House stint. He has been outed as a crass, unethical liar whose portfolio is based on using other people's money. Taxpayers are on the hook now to ferry him from golf course to golf course. Even the banks now know his fairy tale net worth is nowhere near what he claims.
The reckoning, when it comes, will be mighty for the Donald and his bank.
13
@Honey - When trump lands in jail because of his
crimes will he still have Secret Service protection?
3
Obviously, you are not from NY. There is always a loan shark eager to lend if you can come up with the vigorish.
Trump has made America into his vig to get off the hook.
The House is more likely to experience arson than the Doral.
This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper.
"Deutsche Bank’s relationship with Trump, rather than being an odd outlier, is a kind of object lesson in how the bank lost its way."
Object or Abject?
8
Capitalism has become nothing but a giant scam to fleece people for the .1 % like our Criminal-in-chief, Trump and people need to go to prison and be stripped of their assets for enabling this grifter to ruin many other people's lives. Deutsche bank needs to be shut down or at least prevented from doing business in America and some of the leaders need to be prosecuted for not fulfilling their fiduciary duties.
26
It seems to me that there is much more too be revealed about the bank and Trump. I believe somehow Putin guaranteed some of the loans to Trump and he uses that as a lever to manipulate his puppet in the White House.
19
This is a fascinating read. Hopefully people can see from this peephole into the workings of mega banks that they are bad news. If these banks were people they would be psychopaths and yet we've allowed them to run roughshod over our economy, our government, our tax paying citizens, any sense of decent human goodness, on and on. Perhaps you might conclude that were all just very stupid but it looks to me that the fix is in and has been for some time.
12
As Joker asked" have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?" The bankers, willing to risk their institution's reputations, bottom lines and investors capital have...
9
"The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, created to shield borrowers from avaricious lenders, has been neutered. The presumption that the government needs to actively police what banks are doing has been replaced by the empirically dubious assumption that the private sector can mostly look out for itself. This hasn’t solved Deutsche Bank’s fundamental problems — its business model is broken, its balance sheet is littered with unwanted assets, its years of misconduct are under government investigation — but it has afforded the bank and the entire industry some much-welcomed breathing room."
An actual swamp is a much more valuable, necessary entity than either Deutsche bank or T.rump.
11
This is equal parts interesting, ingenious, and infuriating. It sounds remarkably like the last 100 years of the Roman Empire when money was printed to finance vanity projects, making the whole idea of Roman Civilisation seem like a quaint historical footnote.
We know how that ended. This will too.
927
@Todd Ingenioius like a Ponzi scheme. His deal with Vrablic is just taking the Ponzi lure to otherwise sophisticated bankers instead of rubes.
31
@Todd
The Romans printed money? Please give some references. I never heard that paper money was used by the Romans. Gutenberg started European printing with moveable type around 1450, long after the fall of the Roman Empire.
11
@Todd
Various Roman emperors debased their currency during hard economic times or when necessary to pay the troops, always the power behind the leader. I've never heard that they used paper money.
9
"The whole idea — that one arm of the bank would lend money for the purpose of paying off defaulted debts owed to another part of the company — seemed crazy, but Vrablic was excited by the prospect of landing a major deal with a major new client."
America is paying the price for the greed and opaque management at Deutche Bank, his huge financial enabler.
The same bank that "skated" through the last "Great Recession," is headed in the same direction with Trump's financial deregulation campaigns.
In my view 2017 "Great Tax Cut" was the first of many moves that have put the US economy on shaky ground. It wouldn't surprise me if our next financial meltdown--triggered maybe by the Corona virus or excess financial stretching--makes the Great Depression look tame.
I don't trust Trump, his bubble economy, or the economic captains in his shallow administration. We're all captive to Trump and Deutche Bank now.
1096
@ChristineMcM God knows how this is corrected or even ameliorated, but be happy, at least, that it can come out in the open like this. It would be much worse if things like this didn't become public knowledge.
47
@ChristineMcM
Regarding this 'great economic cycle' trump will tout: The tax cut gave corporations a windfall that did not go into capital improvements or wages. Instead, money went to stock buybacks that has inflated 2019 stock prices upwards. But the sugar high is deflating 2020!
In 2019, stock prices went up, without the commensurate increases in earnings and they said as much with smarmy notes like, "economic slowdown' and other nonsense.
That's why trump keeps pestering the FED to continue to reduce rates: so corporations can use leverage (debt) to continue their errant ways. And the FED is complying! Powell is not independent, as he asserts.
Now corporations are 'warning' that they see earnings flattening. That's code talk for "We spent all the money on ourselves and now, the party is over."
Leveling earnings, coupled with trade wars and slower consumer spending will start to show market weaknesses. They are blaming it on the Coronavirus, a handy if not timely scapegoat. Look at Tesla!
84
@ChristineMcM
"America is paying the price for the greed and opaque management at Deutche Bank ..."
America is paying the price for it's own greed, stupidity, and political corruption - the worship of wealth, the branding of education as elitism, and voter antipathy/voter suppression/voter self indulgence.
The GOP unites behind Trump while 'the opposition' splinters along purity test fault lines. Again.
29
Today would be a good day for Donald Trump to release his tax returns to the public - Like he promised he would.
8
@C Feher - Today would be a good day to RESIGN.
4
Donald promised us his tax returns.
12
It's an absolute pure coincidence that this is being published on the day of the State of the Union address.
5
“...was this true? Not really. But it sounded good.”
A few words. Which accurately summarize IT.
Dynamic. Multidimensional plans. Implementations, or not.
Void of ongoing assessments of processes and outcomes.
Plagued by interacting uncertainties, amidst voiced certitudes.
Prevarications and repeated lies. “alt-facts!”
Unpredictabilities effecting and effected by a predictable scoundrel.
Randomness. Impermanence.
Trajectories of failures; business and personal.
Lack of total control: notwithstanding timely and untimely efforts.
The Trump-saga. Enabled by complacency and complicity of...
2
The American bank robbers of the 1930’s and 40’s were celebrated by the common American, for stealing money from the greedy capitalist was a kind of moral victory for the struggling American family.Trump, the populist’s hero is doing just that, though a greedy and reported associate of organized crime, his thievery from the banks, and hiding of his tax returns, which can be construed as cowardice, has become a cultural icon, much like Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde and Baby Face Nelson.
7
I for one want more info on the relationships between Justin Kennedy, Deutsche Bank & the trumps. That seems a little too close for comfort, don’t you think?
29
@Rsq
Mnuchin at Treasury.....the gatekeeper of all those things you find "uncomfortable"
6
So, in summary: a bunch of business people did business
1
The Grand old Polluters/GOP have lots of off shore accounts and Russian and foreign country money and help we know. They don’t know how to be honest and are sore losers. We won 2018 and they still are not over there loss .
8
Very good work, thanks NYT.
12
Nothing wrong in all of this. Really. Business as usual.
1
More proof that trump colluded with Russia to overthrow the duly elected should-be-President Clinton. We need a special prosecutor to look into Russia's control over trump.
13
@Fred
This article says none of that! It paints a fairly benign view of the bank; after all it survived the 2009 meltdown intact.
The real story here is Justin Kennedy and his father, Justice Anthony Kennedy. Apparently Brett Kavanagh clerked for Kennedy who pushed for his being considered for the open seat on the Court - even though Brett was not on the original list. Justice Kennedy retires, he gets to pick his replacement and his son stays out of trouble and makes lots of money. Quid pro quo? I think so,
93
I would like to learn more about the role Justin Kennedy played; this story makes it sound like he was very helpful but nothing untoward is suggested.
7
@Martha MacC
Yes, of course. Why else would an 81 year old man who's been talking about retirement for ten years, retire?
And how exactly did Kennedy's son - who's never even been accused of doing anything wrong - get a guarantee that he would "stay out of trouble"? Did he get a pardon? I must have missed that. Kennedy's son also left DB a decade before Kavanaugh was nominated.
I smell corruption, a rather strong smell of it. How much kick back did Trump give to the agents who advocated for him at Deutschebank? How much money did Trump fork over to the bank executives for approving those loans?
12
There are enough corrupt politicians, criminal business people and gullible customers to keep Deutsche Bank in business forever. They can be as criminal as they want because money is all that matters. Crime is good, according to our fearless leaders. Well, they sure don't fear the brainwashed people of the world, or law enforcement for that matter. Although, instead of calling them law enforcement we should refer to them as the protectors of the criminal overlords. They will beat the poor and grovel before the moneyed criminal class.
The real problem is that cops, lawyers and judges are all siding with the fascists, and why shouldn't they, they have the jobs that they have because they like to cause pain. It's why they defend Trump so well and ignore law. It probably feels like a real accomplishment when they can lie and cheat for the wealthy criminals and get them off.
6
@Chris, I came across the book "A Century of Violence in the Red City : Popular Struggle, Insurgency and Human Rights in Columbia" by Lesley Gill at the library the other Day. Reading about Shakira after watching a 60 Minutes interview with her saying her Lebanese father's small jewelry business had failed in Columbia and having met someone who told me after the 2nd attempted kidnapping of his family, owners of a former civil engineering firm and murder of their body guard, precipitating their move to the US, I decided to check it out. US corporate interests have been at this for a century and now it appears they're bringing it to it's own back yard.
Now the Debt Defaulter in Chief is running up a trillion dollars a year in debt for America. What's the plan? Stiff the lenders? Makes me think about supporting Elizabeth Warren.
16
So Trump is a "rags to riches" self made billionaire? Of course, with help from his Russian friends. How many other Republicans have Russian backers? Somebody knows...
8
@JMT If getting $400 million from Daddy counts as the rags end of that journey, I guess you'd be right.
I'd call it "riches to riches" and nowhere near "self-made."
10
@JMT , there have been articles (maybe a Google search?) on links through the NRA between several republican politicians and Russian donors.
2
He's out of his depth and the only way he's managed to survive his own blaring mistakes is with daddy's money, and that of various banks who've made the egregious mistake of doing business with a man who plays by the Roy Cohn playbook.
What most of us suspect is basically true, even without his tax returns: He more than likely isn't a billionaire and he's a criminal.
All of his misdeeds will eventually be revealed and karma will pay him a visit.
20
@Pamela L. ... I've always thought thar the only reason he ran for office was for lifetime secret service protection
1
Putin has sold off all US depts and now has amassed 2100 tons of gold. He knows the gamblers in the banking business will soon be down the tubes with the rest of western system.
3
@webster s black - So, that's why gold is heading
to $2000 ounce.
2
@webster s black I don't know if that is really true (about Putin or Russia's assets). but I do know how much interest /dividends all that gold pays.
Remember Trump and Mulvaney trying to force through the corrupt approval of the G-7 Summit meeting being held at Trump's underused Doral resort in Florida? One piece of self-dealing the president has not been successful in pulling off.
Investigative journalism by papers like the Washington Post and the NY Times (like this superb article by David Enrich, soon to be a book) is the only thing saving us.
25
"The Red Tie Blues: Celebrating the End of the Trump Reign" provides at least a modicum of satirical relief from all the Trump-related chaos.
3
Trump is a man who gets things done whether it’s his finances or his political ambition. The real story is that a crass real estate guy/reality TV star with a bad tan and crazy hair took ok both the Republican and Democrat political establishments and beat the handily. If those establishment folks had a mustard seed of wisdom they would stop hating Trump and trashing those who voted for him and figure out how he did it. It wasn’t Russians. It’s a bit more nuanced than that—remember when Democrats though nuance was important? They need some now.
Finally, at long last, a relevant article. All along, it was all about the money. Only about the money.
13
Where's Broeksmit and VTB Bank who guaranteed the DB loans?
5
Every parade has leaders and followers. Deutsche Bank was a leading corrupt bank in a corrupt industry. This is the banking industry that Obama bailed out with taxpayer funds because "too big to fail." A welfare recipient got ten months in jail recently for stealing food from a grocery store.
7
Just reading this makes me feel like showering!
11
I feel queasy. I need to lie down...
8
Capitalize profit, socialize loss. Trump's way. DB's way. They're made for each other.
8
Donald John Trump now in his early seventies is still waiting to make his first honest dollar. Perhaps prison industries can assist him in this difficult, complex endeavor.
11
When Trump started running for president, there was already an article by investigative reporters in the German weekly Der Spiegel about his finances.
The article was about about Deutsche Bank's loan for his Chicago project and Deutsche Bank's assessment that his liquid assets amounted to a bit less than $800 million.
Too bad that his cheating and lying about his finances only appears in print in the US now.
In addition, day after Trump was elected, Der Spiegel published an article with the headline "Trump. Der Nebel des Grauens [Trump. The Fog of Horror] over an ghostly looking black and white photo of the White House in the fog in the winter.
The rest is history.
29
@Sarah Thanks for the history lesson, but this article from the NY Times actually paints a fairly benign view of Trump's banking relationship with Deutsche Bank.
I have read Craig Unger's House of Putin House of Trump and Seth Abramson's The case for Collusion; according to them there is more to be suspicious about with our president than is let on in this soft-pedaled report.
It all sounds very reasonable. Mention is made of Russian mob money, but only a mention, nothing to get alarmed about. Everything about Trump and his finances remains very opaque.
7
Sitting at blue collar bar in Queens with the kind of men that Trump has a history of not paying on time, if at all, they were all for him.Some claimed they could not vote for Hillary.
Point out his bad business practices, his treatment of the people that worked for him, his lying, cheating, Russian scheming ways, they give me blank looks or become annoyed
that I am amazed that they have basically no response .
One or two have said something about the economy, but I am now convinced that they identify with this lout to the extent they do not care what he does. A lot of this racism pure and simple. On another level many of these people are flawed people ,some deeply flawed, their lives do not reflect a competency with living.
In Trump they have found another deeply flawed being that represents them in all their failures ,prejudices, petty and great expressions of frustration , fear and hate.
Many of my fellow drinkers can act like louts, in Trump they have found their lout, the one who excuses them for being them.
22
@agonyF: Americans are completely blind to why manufacturing is problematical here. Take it from a marketer of empty factories in Reagan's aftermath.
4
More data on living in what is pretty much just a kleptocratic form of government..SCOTUS slow-walking the case is just one more arm of government that has been taken over by the kleptocratic class.
It is hard to know how to fight this all-pervasive criminality..But I do NOT think electing another clueless billionair like Steyer or Bloomberg is the answer..The straight-shooting on- the- side- of -the- people answers that Bernie has are more and more attractive.-
4
@grace thorsen: Bernie is a broken 45 RPM record.
4
and Bernie can't win in the only 4 states that matter.
1
Why Trump's base will vote for a proven skoundrel like Trump—they're rubes more interested in grievance attacks than making the effort to understand the underlying facts and respond rationally. Con artists like Trump play the same cards to fool the gullible time after time—not so often at the highest levels. At the top greed takes over from non-sophisticated, sloppy thinking and the con magnifies. The grand illusion of Trump and Trumpism will eventually implode—what will be said, "I didn't know, I really was a supporter, terrible man, wait just a moment while I do a 180-turn." Just watch Lindsey Graham to see which direction the wind is blowing.
9
A president in debt to foreign financial institutes for billions?
What could possibly go wrong for America?
11
Why is Trump so protective of his banking records? Because Deutsche Bank wasn't his lender of last resort. It was a conduit for Russian money.
Putin owns Trump.
36
“Against all odds, Trump paid back most of what he owed the bank.”
How?
Isn’t this the most important question here?
37
@Pat Exactly! The author needs to go back to the drawing board and unearth more facts to fully tell this story; maybe if the tax returns are ever released.
And why hasn't the House Ways and Means Committee been more militant / "weaponized" about getting the tax returns given the 1921 Treasury Code law that says the Chair can see anyone's returns that he/she deem necessary to see? Let's get to the truth about all this, someday.
5
'Ackermann told me that he doesn’t recall being consulted'
These fraudsters always claim they make the biggest bucks because it is all on them, until, of course, it isn't. Lying is always the simplest and cleanest way out.
6
@dmckj ....oh sure. The top man in the bank didn't know about a 600 million dollar loan. Ok.
In 2017 the New York Times reported, "Soon after Mr. Trump took office, the bank settled allegations that it helped Russian investors launder as much as $10 billion through its branches in Moscow, London and New York."
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/19/business/big-german-bank-key-to-trumps-finances-faces-new-scrutiny.html
The obscene wealth of Putin's KGB mobsters, stolen from the Russian economy, has thoroughly poisoned banking, politics and media worldwide, including Russia, Europe and the U.S.
The scale of Trump's real estate laundering of Russian money is also staggering. According to a BuzzFeed investigation, some 1,300 Trump-branded condos were sold since the 1980s to shell companies in all-cash transactions, shielding buyer finances and identities.
Some specific transactions in the investigative reports are very peculiar: (i) In 2008, Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev paid Trump $95 million for a property Trump bought only 4 years earlier for $40 million, (ii) In August 2012, "a shell company bought a two-bedroom condo in a Trump-licensed building on Aug. 12, 2010, for $956,768 [and] sold ... to another shell company for $525,000 that same day."
And, Deutsche Bank and Bank of Cyprus (DB's Josef Ackerman was Board Chairman 2014-2019, and Wilbur Ross was Vice Chairman 2014-2017) have eagerly funneled money West, through Trump real estate and otherwise, and today's article is only the tip of the iceberg.
24
If DB causes or goes down in the next financial crisis, you can bet that Trump will be first in line to bail them out.
2
Does anyone really believe that Justice Kennedy retirement out of the blue after one private meeting with Trump had nothing whatsoever to do with the Kennedy son Trump referred to as a "special guy?"
15
@Patti O'Connor
Out of the blue? He was over 80, and had been talking for years about wanting to retire soon.
Having worked as a lawyer in banking on New York for decades, this article rings absolutely true. A few points:
1. German banks have a tradition, changing slowly since 2008, of having “silos” with each division reporting to a member of its supervisory board. Very little communication between silos before getting to the very top level. And they spent most of their time fighting with each other keeping information from other silos.
2. Deutsche Bank was among the worst. Their own employees rolled their eyes at their management.
3. I suspect that Deutsche Bank funded their loans with Russian mob money. The way to do this and keep the sources hidden is: (a) the mob deposits money with Russian banks, (b) the Russian banks loan the money to the Moscow branch of Deutsche, (c) the Moscow branch does an internal loan to its Frankfurt head office, (d) the head office does an internal loan to its New York branch (or subsidiary), and (e) New York books the loan to Trump. This all may be non-recourse to Deutsche through “understandings,” not written, among Trump, Deutsche, and the mob, enforceable by the threat of murder by the mob. You would need access to the Russian banks’ books to confirm this, which Putin is not going to allow. The books in New York and Frankfurt would look like routine bank transactions. The Saudis may do similar things with local Deutsche offices. Hence Trump’s need to stay pals with Putin and the Saudis.
We’ll probably never know.
15
@Alex Kent
Succinct overview!!
Every single American should read your post so that they can begin to understand how the banking/finance industry functions. I lived and worked in Switzerland and Liechtenstein as a trader during the "The Big Bang" of Russian "capitalism" in the 90's. The scheme that you illustrate is the tip of the iceberg. The corruption is so pervasive and massive in scale that it's hard to miss but difficult to break down into "bite size" morsels that an average person can follow it step by step. It will take thousands of the best investigators and years of painstaking work to flesh it out. Unfortunately, none of our prospects for the WhiteHouse has the will or the steal to see it through.
2
After reading this superb investigative journalistic endeavor, is it any wonder Donald Trump refuses to make his tax returns public?The Trump business organization is a house of cards ready to tumble to the table with full disclosure of Trump's financial records especially those tax returns undergoing an audit by the IRS for god only knows how long. Keep printing great journalism New York Times. Without question your readership is the most well-informed in the entire country if not the world.
6
Thanks for the solid article.
Its interesting to me that banks need to hire special teams to go looking for rich white men to loan money to. Essentially the situation is that a small group has more money than they could possibly ever spend, so they have to hire lunatics like DJT to find creative new ways to 'spend big enough'. If he ends up stiffing them, well, that's just business - and besides, if things get really bad, there's always the government. Just make sure you don't do anything really dumb, like loan money to a small business trying to get off the ground or a poor person who needs to cover the rent.
Perhaps someday the system of government-backed megabanks will spiral toward catastrophe, leaving the bankers on their knees just at the moment that a bright young progressive takes the White House and a solid majority of Congress, and--
6
@Eric ... I hate to say this but maybe this new coronavirus will wipe everything out- rich and sadly poor alike, and we can start over.
In the future, we must require copies of every candidate's tax returns, mortgages, personal loans, etc. Then we can decide whether that candidate would be vulnerable to creditors like Deutsche Bank, Russian and Saudi underwriters, etc. Trump was already known to have shady business deals in Atlantic City and multiple bankruptcies in his history. Now we understand the incomprehensible relationship with foreign entities. The right to privacy should not be extended to known liars.
10
It is amazing that a Faux Billionaire, Trump could get away with 6 bankruptcies. Congress should have written the bankruptcy Laws to prevent this from happening. You know, fool me once, shame on you, Fool me twice shame on me.
Instead the Bankruptcy laws were rewritten to protect credit card companies when it came to poorer people filing bankruptcies because of Medical bills, etc.
But h Trump could lie and cheat his way to 6 Bankruptcies
Only i America.
Sounds like it is good that Justice Kennedy stepped down. His son could have gotten caught up in all of the provable crimes surrounding Trump.
Isn't lying on a Bank application for a loan a Federal or State Crime?
8
This insightful piece confirms what many have suspected but no one seems able to prove: that Trump is in serious debt to oligarchs and/or kings in high places.
But no one, least of all Trumpsters, understand or care.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, big money as typified by Wall Street, controls the country.
The Great Recession was engineered by Wall Street, at first unknowingly, and then turned into a bonanza by knowing how to bamboozle politicians and the public.
The Trump money maneuvering by graft and grifting would not make the second page if he weren't President, just another would-be billionaire working the system.
The typical American, now especially Trumpistas, yawn over such big money scheming because they don't understand it, and, anyway, that's just the way rich people do it and I hope someday to do the same.
The continual references to the need to see Trump's tax returns begs the question: why? Does anyone really believe they will accurately and honestly reflect his finances? Why would he not fabricate the numbers with the help of squads of accountants and attorneys, some of whom would not see the real numbers anyway, having been carefully scrubbed, sanitized, and hidden by Saudi princes and Russian oligarchs.
And once, if ever, the truth is revealed, for the aforementioned reasons no one will understand or care. Witch hunt! Fake News! Alternate facts!
Let's face it: the old saw, he who has the gold, rules, has never been truer.
7
I can’t tell you the dismay I felt in reading this piece in the NYTimes this morning written by David Enrich, “The Money Behind Trump’s money.” Enrich left me feeling totally ignorant of the world of high and unscrupulous finance so distant from our more normal world of work hard, be honest, save your pennies for your old age and you, too, in the great country of America can grow up to be president. Could it be that our only way to combat Trump is to support another billionaire like Bloomberg who understands not only the way this alternate world operates but has a more benign attitude toward the multitudes of people like us?
7
The key point of this story is that trump’s company and the donald in particular aren’t credit worthy for regulated financial institutions. he managed to burn all of them along the way; consequently, none will do business with him now. I really hope that the Deutsche Bank files and trump’s tax returns become public after the Supreme Court renders its decision on his appeal. trump is a criminal plain and simple who has made others pay for his poor business decisions and gotten away with it. This record of deception and dishonesty is finally about to catch up with him.
4
I don't understand the point in this type of investigative reporting around Trump anymore. Although interesting, and likely important for the record, it only furthers the divide in the country as it digs in to the reality that Trump has never and will never pay any price for his colossal misdeeds. People on the right shut it out and smirk, people on the left become infuriated.
It is exhausting to read yet another long argument about his criminality when it never leads anywhere. So what if he's a cheat, we all know that. If reporters can't give us information that will make a difference, just keep it in back pages somewhere where no one can see it. Stop baiting us with this information which always turns out to be useless. Trump walks from all of it.
2
@LP
"If reporters can't give us information that will make a difference,"
Here's the rub - so far, nothing has made a difference. Not an audio recording. Not a video tape. Not a telephone transcript. Nothing.
Trump is teflon. His base, the Republican Party and Fox News will accept and defend anything that he does.
1
Germany! If you are listening, please find Trump's tax records held by Deutsche Bank and the millions in loan guarantees the bank received from the Kremlin to secure Trump's loans. You will be amply rewarded.
11
Outstanding article.."If he secretly got money from the Kremlin, Deutsche Bank would probably know."
There has been for years the inference Russian mafia types have funded Trump thru the purchase of overpriced condo's. Also, the inference Russia has guaranteed Trump's loans.
No doubt the CIA and or the FBI knows this already..the depth of their ability to obtain information is overwhelming. That said, when the facts of Trump's frauds over the years does materialize, it will be a story beyond all stories. Does one not think that people in the FBI and CIA know Trump is dangerous to our democracy..that he is beholden in some way to Putin et al.
Time will come when Trump is in front of a jury of his peers and will hear the wrath of those who he defrauded. And, of the Republican's who gave him all the breath Trump needed..they too will be thrown out of office or castigated beyond thought..
607
@RH One can only hope that he will get his due but I doubt it.
57
@RH It is a naive dream to think that "time will come." You are assuming there is any justice in this world. There is not.
43
@RH
This if far more optimistic than I am willing to concede. The criminal at the head of our government, I fear will have his criminality buried for long after his lifetime.
59
When you deal with the mob, you play by their rules. The only good thing in this article is Trump stiffing Merrill Lynch who absconded with tens of thousands of my husband's retirement money in 2008. Trying to rectify that introduced us to a company also run like the mob. Looks like these people all deserve each other.
4
All the blue collar workers, the people who profess that Trump has their back, were stiffed.
4
If bank executives actually went to jail for breaking the law, like skirting sanctions or laundering ill-gotten money, or rigging the Libor, we wouldn’t have to worry about their most nefarious clients because no one would give them money.
2
"Over the course of two decades, the bank lent him more than $2 billion. Against all odds, Trump paid back most of what he owed the bank."
Good bankers, good customer. Profitable for both. Nobody lost money.
Democrats lost the presidency, and are now still furious.
Now, why not go after the wife of Bernie Sanders, who really bankrupted her school?
@novoad
so you're good with bankruptcy and stiffing contractors as "business models"?
3
@novoad - Chump Change by comparison.
1
Apparently the culture of the big banking business rewards colossal failure, excruciatingly bad judgment, and contempt for the law with buckets of money and frequent promotions. You have to wonder how many other Trumps have benefited or continue to benefit under the radar from schemes cooked up by amoral financiers like the executives at Deutsche Bank.
Sadly for all of us ordinary folks, it will probably be a century before historians crack open the hidden files in Trump Tower and the archives of DB and Trump's other partners -- surely including Russian oligarchs and the mob -- to expose the extent, no doubt breathtaking, of illegality underlying the 45th president's "wealth" and power. By then the principles will all be dead and so will we, who would benefit today from knowing the full, unvarnished truth.
3
I can see at least three reasons why DB is going to such length to try to hide Trump's financials.
First, if Trump sinks, DB can kiss goodbye to any money he still owes them.
Second, DB could miss any new scandal involving money-laundering and the fines that could come from it. Worst of all, DB might even see its banking license being revoked. Such a scandal would also chase away many bona-fide clients.
Finally, if the truth comes out, this would scare away DB's other dodgy clients: the ones that are ready to pay hefty fees just so that DB helps them hiding their true businesses. We can only guess how much DB is hooked on such clients to make a profit and pay its directors fat bonuses and stock options.
6
Follow the money, follow the money! Why wasn’t Trump scrutinized much more when he won the nomination? Was everyone distracted by the bright, shiny object that is Trump and his machine?
At least people are digging now. This is an illuminating article. Keep shining the light under the Trump rocks where the snakes live.
3
Everybody is waiting for the decision of the SCOTUS in March on the matters of Trump's financial statements and taxes.
1
Money speaks. Always has, no matter how corrupt it's 'acquaintance' and acquisition. And Trump, as well as Deutsche Bank (without acquitting others...for the same predicament), are richly endowed by driving in such a compromised, and dubious, mafia-like terrain. We all suspect, strongly, that Trump has been, and remains, a crook. Why do you think he has been fighting 'tooth and nail' so his tax returns won't see daylight? Too bad that this democracy is held prisoner to money's whims, and it's deep inequities, even at the highest levels of government. If any doubts, just look at 'Citizens United', a selling out of any remaining credibility in the Supreme Court. But, lest we think we have the right to criticize those 'august' institutions, don't you think we the people may be at fault...for lack of participation, and establishing public supervision and healthy regulations to tone down human corruptibility? Just asking...
1
How much of Trump’s repayment of his debt to Deutsche Bank has been underwritten by US taxpayers?
2
"making introductions to wealthy Russians who were interested in investing in Western real estate. "
As almost all omdern wealth in Russia is tied to its intelligence services it might be that Mr Trump is owned by them.
Now look at White House: FBI, CIA and other US intelligence services are bad guys and Mr Putin is a credible friend.
Do you see a pattern?
Russians won.
5
Trump is operating our country budget like all of his failed businesses. Our country will face the same, the young paying for the reckless criminal element. The corruption goes to all branches, including The Supreme Court. It makes me think that we need to overhaul with a Sanders or the like. Our country is anything but ethical, moral, principled. Now might we learn how McConnell’s net worth skyrocketed on a salary of ~200K a year?
Overall, the country is broken. Too few Adam Schiffs in that horrible town.
6
Just as before, it's still "follow the money."
How did Trump manage to pay back such enormous debts?
Who were the other clients served by the private banking division, whose money bailed Trump out?
Who or what backstopped DB against Trump's sketchy loans? I doubt that DB would really have done those loans without syndication...
By the time this all gets found out, it will be too late to do much good, except to put an exclamation point on this disgraceful chapter of US history.
3
This isn’t just a trump problem, this is a “big business” and banking issue. Yet, people will still vote in droves (for both sides) for the candidates (of whom often take contributions from individuals like the ones mentioned in this article), because they believe they have their best interests at heart.
I often wonder why the the poorest think a man like Trump cares about them, when quite simply, he doesn’t.
Identity politics at its finest, not just limited to the US, but the world over.
1276
@Nicky
"I often wonder why the the poorest think a man like Trump cares about them, when quite simply, he doesn’t." I think it has to do with the failure of our democracy.
The poor do not perceive that our major political parties (Rep or Dem) speak for them...perhaps because they are run by "elites." So they vote for conman Trump who will upend the elite political structure and provide great entertainment. The poor knows that Trump does not care for them...and they also think that the elite Rep and Dems do not care either.
So they watch Trumps antics much like a TV show.
46
@Nicky
These things aren't new. 150 years ago Anthony Trollope wrote THE WAY WE LIVE NOW, about a financier, Melmotte, who manages to hoodwink every businessman in London. Trollope's summation of Melmotte is "a vile City ruffian", which seems to fit Trump very well.
40
@Nicky This is not a both sides problem. Trump is funded by Russian oligarchs through Deustche Bank. Whenever he's facing bankruptcy, he hits up the Russians.
86
"...laundering billions of dollars on behalf of Russian oligarchs, among many others..." The key phrase, among many in an excellent, thorough, revealing, and exceedingly fine piece of investigative journalism.
I say that as a retired international banker with a US global bank, and also as a former forensic CPA with a global accounting/consulting company. Neither of which company, by the way, had or would have a relationship with the Trump organization. Trust me, fellow readers, this report is accurate in all respects in terms of how banking is done in certain quarters and at this level. Every sentence rings true from my experience. This is the honey pot of evidence against Trump and his organization, which is why they will go to any extreme to keep it from view. Whether it will ever come to light is the only question. And no doubt the average American voter will never see this, and would not understand most of it even if they did. Trump knows this, and is betting his future on it, because he has to. He must be defeated in November.
2426
@Michael : I just wrote a response and agree with you 100 percent. My response - which hasn't been approved and printed yet - was more specific about Trump and not disclosing his taxes - but I did add that no banker in the 1990s would touch Trump - as a former banker myself - and explains why he will not disclose his taxes unless the Supreme Court rules that he must do so. I am a NYC native and hope that Bloomberg gets the Democratic nomination because he is the only one - a self-made billionaire - no scandals of any kind - a Wall Street guy with integrity and a three-term NYC Mayor - who can beat Trump.
304
@Michael Well stated. Trump owns more than 500 companies, no doubt many of them are shell companies used to easily hide laundering activities. Both the House and Senate have introduced bills that passed through committees to limit the use of shell companies, yet both stalled before being taken up by the full membership for some reason. I have written my representatives about this, but they don't seem too interested which is pathetic. Can anyone doubt Trump is guilty of massive financial fraud? The system is broken.
262
Those holding the gravest secrets capable of putting trump in jail, suddenly "committed suicide" under suspicious circumstances, at the end of 2019.
Jeffrey Epstein in Aug 2019.
Tom Bower, in Nov 2019.
Who else died recently, or will die with trump's secrets?
180
Again: The most bizarre aspect (among many) in this Trump Twilight Zone episode of our history is how much and how long he has gained and remained in that office despite publicly widespread infamy, any one element of which would condemn any other person. He is like a retrovirus that mutates (with enabling) so that he may not only survive but thrive on infamy or notoriety, twisting the system of the body politic to his benefit. It acts like an HIV would do to the defense system of a physical body, and of course, Trump does it with no shame whatsoever. Our antivirus in this case is our VOTE, as cast in the majority who never wanted him.
6
For anyone else, it would be criminal behavior on both ends of this loan. Maybe justice will someday prevail for prevaricators.
2
My father, a Trump voter, always approached money as something be responsible with, never hanging it over others or wielding it for sinister purposes. He also took pride in befriending others with similar financial maturity.
Apparently, in the instance of the presidential candidate he supports, he finds those qualities totally irrelevant.
3
Justin Kennedy, a son of the Supreme Court justice Anthony Kennedy. Now there is a case of a must investigation into corruption all the way back for Goldman Sachs and Justin Kennedy's connection to Steven Mnuchin.
Did SC Justice Anthony Kennedy step down by choice or was he given an ultimatum by Trump and company?
What a tangled web is woven when people try to deceive. This will be the blowup of the century when it all comes out eventually.
6
Descriptions of how Trump managed his bankers echo how he’s managing the US Senate and the GOP overall, a combination of threats and wooing. His willingness to sue bankers mirrors his aggressive no holds barred attacks on anyone who gets in his political way.
These bare knuckle tactics are accompanied by the bribes, the trips on Air Force one, the time at Mar A Lago, the golf outings, the White House events the same way he offered treats to his bankers. Only now he has at his disposal the very choicest of morsels to those who help him.
The GOP is ignoring his corruption in the same way his bakers did.
2
The financial strategy employed by the guy in the White House in two words: shell game.
5
Mention is made of Trump’s comment to SC Justice Kennedy about Kennedy’s son after the State of the Union speech. Does the author see any connection to Justice Kennedy’s resignation from the Court and Justin Kennedy’s employment at Deutsche Bank?
6
All the money first comes from the bottom and moves up. On the way it becomes perverted and distorted through leveraging and other financial gymnastics; until it becomes a different value, virtually unrelated to its source. This process done in the shape of a pyramid is sound. Done in the shape of a skyscraper, the only risk is how much of the building will topple? Failure above mid way means less loss. Failure below mid way means more to catastrophic losses. Left to their own devices, the manipulators in the private sector would begin in the basement. The people need the government to keep this point of risk taking well above the half way mark. Trump is a punter. He will risk all for anything. That is to say he will say anything, do anything, and lie all the way to one of his golf courses.
1
So, in effect, Trump has remained financially afloat due to his Inordinately strange love-hate relationship with a reckless German-owned bank that, itself, is tied to cash inflows from Russian oligarchs.
Nothing to see here, say his admirers. Move along.
5
Is there some kind of review committee where postings go up a chain of approval before they appear here? Gresham's law is that bad money drives out the good when financial markets are not equitably regulated. Trump corrupts money.
2
Well OK... so Deutsche Bank nixed the loan for his Scottish course. So who's he fronting for? He and Don junior will tell you baldly that they are simply reinvesting the munificent cash profits from all those decades of low debt real estate finance. British disclosure rules are tighter than ours. That's the shoe that will drop next. You're working on it, right?
4
Unfortunately disclosures like these don‘t change the game anymore - it proofs what we all knew for less or more. What will financial institutions look like from now on when the US government has transformed itself in essence into a criminal organisation?
4
When the Grand old Polluters /GOP have lots of off shore accounts and millions of them don’t pay taxes they will have plenty of fun money. Mr Bloomburg or Mr Biden must make them pay taxes.
2
Smoke and mirrors. That's been Trump's M.O. his entire life. It's frustrating for people who are legitimate to see this strategy working for him. Lies about everything. The value of his properties, his capacity for thought, his grades, SAT scores, his height, his golf game, etc. Meanwhile he's in the White House and married to one of the most beautiful women in the world. Large scale grifting sometimes pays.
1
As the saying goes...if you owe the bank 10,000 dollars, it’s your problem. If you owe them a billion, it’s the banks problem.
4
“The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, created to shield borrowers from avaricious lenders, has been neutered. The presumption that the government needs to actively police what banks are doing has been replaced by the empirically dubious assumption that the private sector can mostly look out for itself.”
How’d this work out for us in 2008? Under this administration we’re again allowing bankers to play roulette with the U.S. economy on the line?
It is simply absurd that as banks are raking in record profits, our government is most concerned with helping them make even more money!
Federal officials have abdicated their responsibility to help consumers and to stop another crash, and that’s exactly what’s going to happen if all of these regulations are repealed.
11
Thank you for your outstanding journalism. You are a hero.
8
I hope this article gets the attention it deserves. My goodness America, come on.
10
@LT It's only possible for an article to get the attention it deserves if several late night TV celebs talk about it a lot and then lots of people Tweet about it and then more celebs talk about it.
3
I hope to see many more pieces like this. Too bad they weren't written in 2015.
8
"Its rap sheet includes manipulating international currency markets; playing a central role in rigging a crucial benchmark interest rate known as Libor; whisking billions of dollars in and out of Iran, Syria, Myanmar and other countries in violation of sanctions; laundering billions of dollars on behalf of Russian oligarchs, among many others; and misleading customers, investors and American, German and British regulators"
"The business model of Wall Street is fraud." -Bernie Sanders.
End bank regulations, responds Trump.
The Left is moderate.
The Right is extreme.
Centrists need to choose a side.
7
Sadly, as this article illustrates, Donald J. Trump has spent his entire life with no other interest than self-aggrandizement and the acquisition of money. It is singular to the American experience that such a public figure has never shown any interest in anything beyond his own base desires.
And even sadder this wasted life - at least I consider it wasted despite his "accomplishments" - will continue unchecked. The real lesson of Trump is the fact that a person may incredibly go through life in the modern world breaking every law, stiffing his partners - both business and personal, and living an absolute immoral existence and is never called to account. This article shows that there has always been - and continues to be - those who will gladly mortgage their own reputations and freedom so that this man can do what he pleases.
His life has almost been the opposite of the quaint Horatio Alger stories one heard long ago. I think that is the true sign of our time.
I'd sure like to see him get his comeuppance. But I fear we will never live to see it.
5
Maybe it's time for Nancy Pelosi to reach out to Angela Merkel to have trump's Deutsche Bank accounts investigated. She could offer a little congressional funding. Certainly wouldn't be breaking any laws and is definitely not impeachable.
20
@YReader: Right on - it's all legal and and on the up and up now, isn't it...
Good to know that a failed, corrupt bankrupt businessman can get a millions of dollars in shady loans when poor people are JAILED for not having enough money to pay a parking ticket. We're fast becoming a third-world country - and now we need UN monitors to watch over our elections.
10
I am rendered "poorer" in many ways by the atrocity that is Donald Trump, and I am ashamed as an American. I like to think that in the long run America is better than he is and will recover its fundamental founding values. We have several deserving qualified candidates to provide the leadership needed, if only voters of all ages will get out to vote in the next election.
5
“We just looked the other way,” a former executive explains. “That was the Deutsche Bank culture.”
It would seem that people looking the other way is the root of every Trump success.
9
Trump is owned by the Russians. I would not be surprised if Putin declared Trump a dependent on his Russian tax return.
10
Unless something obvious fits in a short simple sentence on a quick billboard drive-by, then forget about it. This senate is thinking like the lowest common denominator in Trump's base.
Evidence based criminality makes no difference. in this Bizzarro world.
6
I would like a in depth investigation of Supreme Court Justice Kennedy’s son Justin Kennedy’s work at Deutsch Bank as Trump’s go to guy for bailout when no other bank would touch him.
I would also appreciate
a closer look at the surprise retirement of Supreme Court Justice Kennedy whether it had had any connection to his son Justin Kennedy connection with the questionable
loans he helped Trump get.
It is beyond suspicious it calls into question the corruption of our entire system.
8
@Wait Still : It surely does smell rotten doesn't it?
Once again, you have fired and missed. His lawyers can issue a denial, just like they did the NBC/Lawrence O'Donnell. The technical elements of the transaction matter. The recently revealed deposit from the Russian bank was used under the money creation mechanisms of reserve banking to establish the lending capacity for the loan to DJT, without ever directly connecting the loan with the deposit. The dots are all there for the connecting, one needs only to understand where money comes from. Pssst - it is ex-nihilo.
1
Those of us who witnessed Trump's antics in the 1980's and 1990's were well aware of his character when he announced for the presidency and were appropriately dismayed. I believe that a large proportion of his current supporters awakened to politics after either a long hiatus or had never been been thoughtfully involved with politics, but were now thrilling to his clarion call and thus unaware of the Trump "sleaze factor". His populist rantings struck true; they were able to throw a rock through those "out of touch, liberal, big city folk's" windows. But this well-researched article shows that his supporters are more like a person who wakes up from a coma and views the doctor smiling and standing over her as a savior, not realizing the Doc had been abusing her the whole time she was unconscious. Good job!
5
Do we have a right as U.S. citizens and voters that our President is not a criminal? This article made my head spin and I'd have to read it a couple more times to fully understand it. Why are tax returns not required? Do we not at least have the right to a President who paying his fair share like the rest of us who have less ability to play the system?
4
Reading this sordid story simply demonstrates that Trump and Deutsche Bank were engaged in complex money laundering schemes. No wonder Trump doesn't want his tax returns revealed. And frankly, I believe Deutsche Bank is lying when they say they don't have them, or if they really never obtained them before making these questionable loans, they were operating like some kind of mob operation with no oversight or responsibility. Their shareholders should be alarmed in the extreme, and frankly the SEC should be looking into their operations.
10
Deutsche Bank is just one of many enablers in Trump's long trail of destruction.
They're another group of (mostly) men who run behind him cleaning up the gigantic messes he creates everywhere he goes because of what they also stand to lose when he goes down.
Besides bankers, he has now involved more lawyers and members of Congress to smooth over or even cover up all of the damage in his wake.
499
@furnmtz While nobody cares about Deutsche Bank/Trump "dealings", those of us lowest on the food chain ( seniors living on s/s and 1/8% interest rates on savings) will be drowning in the detritus of Trump's wake and living on mac 'n cheez.
46
The likeliest scenario is that big customers of Deutsche Bank mandated a clear path for Trump loans and that this went unspoken.
Trump of course pushed the limits of largesse.
But there are Trump towers in all the places where wealthy Russians of dubious means go.
4
Maybe we'll never know, but I'm curious if Deutsche still has his loans on their books. I wouldn't be surprised if they're just servicing them and that Trump's friends a little farther to the east actually have the notes.
6
NYT calls Deutsche Bank "a reckless institution willing to do business with clients nobody else would touch." The loans aren't reckless if the loan guarantors are "solid" and willing to "make good" on the debt if the borrower defaults.
Therein lies the important story concerning Trump which is completely missing. Who are Trump's guarantors? Is it Russia? What ongoing promises has he made to retain these loans?
Also, it is ludicrous to believe bank employees care about Deutsche's reputation. In the banking business, the phrase is "yield to me" meaning all that matters is the commission I get paid when the loan funds.
Nevertheless, the article depicts Trump as a scurrilous businessman who repeatedly failed to pay contractors. That story should be required reading before anyone is allowed to vote in 2020 because it underscores the character of the man America selected to lead & explains the many promises, such as manufacturing jobs, that never materialized.
51
@Hard Money Lender Bascially, Trump is a time-share salesman. Trump voters are classic time-share purchasers, who later whine about 'not knowing' what they were buying into and the long-term consequences.
Not one ounce of sympathy from me.
11
"...the empirically dubious assumption that the private sector can mostly look out for itself."
Itself, nothing else.
10
@Positively: This is bad money driving out the good. It is the subject of "Gresham's Law".
One way or the other, Trump is indebted to Russia in ways that are probably intricate and web-like. I am sure Deutsche Bank is in the mix but just look at Trump's behavior. His lying about disclosing his taxes while on the campaign trail - saying he would do so - once the IRS tax audit was complete - (that was a complete lie - there is nothing in the Federal Tax Code that precludes disclosure of taxes while under audit - and Warren Buffet countered Trump's claim for non-disclosure and submitted his own under audit taxes as proof - Buffet was trying to call out Trump's lying.) Now, Trump's refusal to disclose his taxes has morphed to the Supreme Court and they will hear arguments on this matter at the end of March beginning of April and render an opinion in June. The bottom line question is: What is the problem with making a two-minute phone call to Mazars LLP - Trump's accountants - and have them disclose his taxes? Every NYC banker in the 1990s knew not to lend to Trump - he had rolled right over them - so he found Deutsche bank and here we are - a lying President who is potentially being blackmailed and has placed the United States in a compromising position with Russia... "Russia, if you are listening..." and it goes from there. These are very disturbing times and unless Trump and his money issues are not addressed, our election process will be compromised - yet again - with Russian tampering - and the United States will no longer be a democracy.
51
Kennedy may be a judge on a case in which Trump will have to turn over records that include dealing with Deutsche Bank that includes business between Kennedy's son and Trump --- this makes the Hunter Biden affair seem like nothing. Kennedy should recluse himself if it comes to this case.
9
@Jerry Harris
Kennedy retired. That's how we got Kavanaugh.
6
@Jerry Harris Kennedy has retired from the court. He was replaced by Brett Kavanaugh.
4
Justice Kennedy retired. Kavanaugh was for confirmed.
2
The reason that this will never stop is because the mainstream Democratic politicians are as culpable as the Republicans in protecting institutions like Deutsche Bank. Democrats should stop acting bewildered at Bernie Sanders' popularity.
7
It takes, globally speaking, roughly 3.5 million people to enable the existence of one billionaire. And this article seems to make that an inverted biomass pyramid. Now that's what I call unstable.
5
While maybe very interesting, this article is too long to gain traction in our fly-by media. Better if it was printed day after day in excerpts.
These days, it's all about controlling the narrative, keeping the story alive.
7
American Democracy has been "For Sale" for decades. Its only in the past 20-years or so that one of the two major political parties is an advocate of such behaviors. The GOP is no longer recognizable as a bastion of free markets, strategic alliances, promoting freedom abroad or law and order at home. Trump is not an anomaly, rather he is the embodiment of the reckless amoral behavior of many involved in global capitalism.
8
The love of money is the root of all evil. 1 Timothy 6:10. Tired of calling him the president, the “WH Resident” escapes consequences again, whether it’s the banking industry, the Mueller Report, or the impeachment process.
Like in the movie The Matrix, some among us take the pill to ignore reality, holding off reality awhile longer.
6
Turns out Russia is much smarter than the US. They are winning in the takeover of our country.
9
@Tricia Putin was definitely smarter in knowing how he could manipulate a crooked trump and the republican party.
4
"Greed is good" from the movie, Wall Street. This article reads like an internal ponzi scheme at Deutsche bank, with Trump as the center of the wheel. It appears that Trump would have been bankrupt if he had not been bailed out by the bank. Avarice prevailed.
Nothing surprises me about Trump's malfeasance, because he learned from his father and Roy Cohn, how to defy and skirt the system to his benefit. Along with the power and pull of money, spoke in terms of grandiosity. The Madoff effect.
Two things however struck a chord with me. 1. Deutsche Bank's role in funding Auschwitz and 2. If any deal was struck between Justice Kennedy and Trump, protecting Justin Kennedy from any legal trouble. Did the Justice resign as part of a bargain? With Trump's track record, it does not sound that far fetched.
21
Get the tax returns.
19
Nearly as bad as the behaviour of Trump (no surprise there) is the behaviour and sense of greed/entitlement of the bank.Here it is Deutsche Bank but you could substitute any other bank's name and it would still be accurate.
4
If American's don't think we live in a corrupt society they are naive. Corporations play by different rules than citizens.Why is a criminal organization like Deutsche Bank still in business?
10
Rotten to the core and frightening in all its aspects. Our fortunes or lack thereof turn on the bad decisions made by a few .
7
Nothing like having a "Chief Executive" (or should I say Mob Boss) who "owes" pariah banks, foreign governments, and questionable private individuals. Not too susceptible to blackmail or extortion, right?
13
Ironically Trump weaves his web so tightly in all money matters, that he has been able to defraud banks of millions. This skill is now being reapplied to our constitution and the presidency. The questions remains: are our senators like the Deutsche bankers, willing to go along with him as they skate free of all obligations. Like him, they are as guilty of defrauding the country.
Are we on the precipice of becoming a banana Republic?
7
The President's taxes need to bake in full sunlight. Putting TrumpInc's dealmaking secrets on display is the only way American democracy will recover from this nightmare.
7
Donald Trump has a long history of bankruptcy (who else has a business model that seems to "build in" bankruptcy as a solid and viable way to manage a business?) So money, for Trump - and lack thereof - has always been a problem - even his father recognized it and cut him off. Perhaps the most illustrative point here is Trump's refusal to disclose his taxes. He stated he would do so on the campaign trail - after his Federal tax audit was completed - to which Warren Buffet responded there is nothing in the Federal Tax Code which precludes disclosure of tax returns while under audit - and submitted his own "under audit" taxes - to prove the point. Trump has fought tooth and nail to ensure his taxes are not disclosed - and it has now morphed all the way to the Supreme Court - which will hear the case in March- early April - and render an opinion in June. Most importantly, what is the problem with Trump placing a phone call to Mazars LLP to authorize disclosure of his taxes - a two minute phone call? Perhaps it's Russia's money to Trump when no one else - except Deutsche Bank would lend to him...money laundering and perhaps much, much more. It is quite possible Trump is being blackmailed..."Russia, if you are listening..." or worse - placing the United States in a compromised position with our elections ...Mueller testifying that Russia "is plotting 2020 voter interference as we sit here..." Keep digging, Mr. Enrich, the democracy of the United States depends on it!
25
Greed is good motto is justified? I fear that too many just don’t care about recklessness and ruthlessness. It’s almost as if there are cheers for the scorpion that stung the frog for the well known favor of transport across the river. Gangsters are winners. Is that all we need to know? When does follow the money pull back the curtain? No time soon, so it appears.
10
Further reading.....”The Panama Papers”
11
What about the Deutsche whistle-blower? https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/business/val-broeksmit-deutsche-bank-trump-whistle-blower.html?action=click&module=RelatedCoverage&pgtype=Article®ion=Footer
9
@Anonymous This is right on point. How could the article totally ignore the key point on DB funding sources (especially when the NYT has previously reported on it)?
3
@also Anonymous Exactly. That seemed very strange.
2
Let’s try this again and see if the NYT publishes it....please investigate the connection between Justice Kennedy stepping down, his son’s work at this bank and trump
114
I am very interested in this aspect also, and would like some reporters to really delve into Judge Kennedy’s resignation. I am pretty convinced there was a quid pro quo there involving his son.
27
@WJ : Is there a tight lid being held down on that potential story such that is hasn't shown up yet - too dangerous to investigate?
3
@Randé
..."dangerous" meaning people could get bumped off ? No-one would be surprised !
Trump was SO VERY upset when a Washington Post journalist was murdered and chopped up in Turkey, wasn't he? But he never censured his Saudi Prince Charming ......who holds the purse strings...
Still paltry compared with Cheney-Halliburton no bid contracts and Bush Carlyle Saudi war profiteering.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/dick-cheney-wanted-in-nigeria-for-halliburton-bribes
https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2006-03-06-0603060120-story.html
https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2002/03/18/319881/index.htm
10
The financial relationship of the Trump and Kushner families are complicated, I’m sure this is intentional in order to keep it as secret as possible.
What is not complicated are the emotions driving the bank and Trump family... the desire to have power over people and the greed which insists it has ability to decide who has money in order to keep a small group of people with the wealth. The bank funded the right wing nazi fascists and Hitler’s evil regime and funds the right wing proponents today. Trump is a fascist and the bank is slyly happy to support his endeavors.
Money is just the tool to support the emotion of greed and the desire to power-over others. Power-over, to them, means hurting and killing the other.
16
A dirty bank with dirty clients and dirty loans - kind of like the bar in Star Wars but in $1500 suits.
11
God help us.
12
Why is this not the top story on the NYT Home Page? Please move it up to the top and keep it there for 2 weeks until every media outlet is compelled to repeat it.
84
If Obama did this...
16
I was once a commercial credit analyst with a nationally known ratings institution, an analyst at a commercial bank for years and from that experience and knowledge, I can inform in no uncertain terms Trump could not secure financing in the U.S. It is clear to me, he received credit from abroad, probably laundered through Russian oligarchs, who also made down payments on real estate(purchase of parcels, condos) used as collateral for real estate bank financing in the U.S. Only with significant equity in said real estate, as bank collateral could Trump get financing.
75
@tennvol30736 Further, I don't think it possible Trump's financing outside the U.S. would have gotten off the ground without the backing of oligarchs, likely from Russia and Eastern Europe. And then there were the Miss Universe? (Russia) beauty contests in Moscow(what could have happened?), Melania and his father, as I recall, an official in a Eastern Communist administration. What a coincidence.
13
@tennvol30736 Similarly, I have no doubts that Trump will ultimately be directly linked to criminal monies from Russia. Lev Parnas, who received $1M from a Russian bank account, may be the most obvious and direct link, and one can be sure the southern district of New York will likely file indictments of Trump within a month of two of Trump's (hopefully rapid) departure.
Given his son's deep involvement, Kennedy should remove himself from any cases involving Trump, but we know that GOP toadies never see compromised involvements as such.
9
@Scott S
The only differences, between the Framers’ time and present day, are the scientific and technological advancements. The pathological quest for power and wealth, as demonstrated by Royal opulence and waste while the masses suffered (many dying from diseases and starvation), was the same as it is today. The Framers were quite aware of the devastation caused by inequities.
37
Most engineered things to make sure they themselves would always be on the better side of the divide. Today, the wealthy and the rural still benefit from the systems they put in place. We a,ready have a moneyed aristocracy, so why not a king to go along with it, since the rest of us are little more than serfs?
5
"One reason all these files [at Deutsche Bank] could be so illuminating is that the bank’s relationship with Trump extended well beyond making simple loans. Deutsche Bank managed tens of millions of dollars of Trump’s personal assets. The bank also furnished him with other services that have not previously been reported: providing sophisticated financial instruments that shielded him from risks and outside scrutiny, and making introductions to wealthy Russians who were interested in investing in Western real estate. If Trump cheated on his taxes, Deutsche Bank would probably know. If his net worth is measured in millions, not billions, Deutsche Bank would probably know. If he secretly got money from the Kremlin, Deutsche Bank would probably know."
All we need now is one good whistle blower.
200
@Eero My guess is that we will see a deluge of leaks once Trump 'secures' the GOP nomination.
Let's hope so.
8
@Eero. What we need now is the paper trail of the receipts. And even then, Trump Inc. will try to throw flack up to distract.
I'm not holding my breath that the Supreme Court will rule for them to be provided, though.
15
@Tanner
"I'm not holding my breath that the Supreme Court will rule for them to be provided, though."
My thoughts as well.
SCOTUS could have upheld he lower courts' decisions, but instead decided to look and make a ruling on the matter.
I'm guessing they did this so they could block exposure of Trump*.
8
Finally. Thanks for doing the work Pelosi and Schumer are incapable of doing for reasons that probably aren’t that surprising. The one item that wasn’t addressed would be the volume of whatever Putin’s game garnered for DB and how Trump’s facilitation played out. My gut tells me MBS is involved in some way.
109
The mysteries here aren't solved, just put more plainly in sight. Of course Pelosi and Schiff are aware of Trump's various forms of finance fraud, but it's still not enough evidence to take action against.
Yet.
11
@Patrick Lovell While this article is certainly enlightening, it does not require the same level of accuracy that P&S would need to impeach the president (again). Most of what is written here is hearsay (I didn't see any links to official DB paperwork). What we really need is hard undeniable facts with solid witnesses that can't be stopped from testifying.
Even then, the Trump propaganda channels will do their best to obfuscate, confuse, twist and lie to make sure public opinion of his right wing monkeys keeps viewing him favorably.
8
@dd369 Thank you for your thoughtful response. I get it but if I were Mueller I think I'd have most of what you rightfully point out.
3
I suspect that Stephanie Clifford (Stormy Daniels) has more business ethics than Trump or the sorry cast of Deutsche Bank employees, past and present, mentioned in this article.
Great story. Thanks.
139
This is great work. Thank you. It's terrifying that he Trump administration is working so diligently to make it even easier to do what's described here.
164
Perhaps a small point, and yet... The ‘illustration’ for the article (Trump’s signature on an IOU) is, at first glance, authentic. Image manipulation is a slippery slope, even with ironic intent.
Though this example is not as egregious as the manipulated Pelosi video, using Trump’s signature as click bait is questionable. I look to the Times for accuracy in content both narrative and illustrative.
26
If I mis-report even $1,000 on my tax return I get a letter from the IRS. How is he not beholden to the same scrutiny?
635
@Tania V
In recent years, the IRS has stopped going after the wealthy due to the Republicans efforts at defunding the agency. Auditing individuals that have unlimited funds to put up a fight takes a lot of resources, and the IRS no longer has the ability to take them on. If you look at the Republicans lowering taxes on the rich and the corporations while running a trillion dollar deficit it all makes sense. This is just more proof that our elected politicians (mostly Republicans, but there are some moderate Democrats involved) want to see a society where the bulk of the tax burden falls on the middle class; and they are succeeding.
170
@Tania V
Tania - the IRS does not have the skills, people or budget to challenge highly sophisticated tax avoidance/evasion structures, frequently involving cross border relationships and transactions. But the IRS is however capable of hunting down minor errors on, for example, charitable donation claims. The rich get richer because their lawyers and other agents have successfully lobbied to defang the IRS. This is how societies fall apart - when the bonds of good faith and fair dealing are destroyed by one group pursuing a selfish end. God help us, for no one else seems up to the job.
122
@Tania V Probably because you are a wage earner. Your employer is required to send your earned income statement to the IRS and a computer can check your filing. Trump is self-employed and can say his earnings are whatever he says there are. Huge cuts in the IRS have made it much more difficult for them to go through the reported tax forms of people like Trump. The IRS doesn't have the time or personnel.
64
If you owe the bank $100k and default, you’re in trouble. If you owe the bank $100M and default, the bank is in trouble. So the bank accepts underwriting from money launderers like say a Russian oligarch.
332
@LFGM
That sounds like Deutsche Bank's business plan. You have to wonder why they are allowed to do business in the U.S.
11
@LFGM Spot on. That is how Putin turned Trump into a Russian asset.
22
This is a huge news story that will be overshadowed by the Iowa Caucuses, the State of the Union, and the Senate (probably) acquittal vote tomorrow. I know there's never a perfect time to release something like this in this neverending 24-hr news circus, but releasing it this week seems particularly inopportune.
142
This article completely misses the point. Since 2011, the loans have come from the private-banking division, which services very high net worth individuals (nine-figure plus) and helps them make investments. Who are these individuals?It's not DB money that was on the line.
64
@Jose
Who's he fronting for on the Trump D.C. hotel investment?
4
@Jose
Actually, you are the one who does not get it. Regardless of the initial source of funds, the loans were made by DB as lender, so it WAS DB money that was on the line.
2
Despite businesses' aversion to regulation and transparency, some agencies like the SEC have done many things to look behind the curtain, at least of public companies. International banking is now the most dangerous area that needs exposure since it can so easily hide off-shore from any merely national regulation.
From the Panama Papers to tax havens to layers of corporate shells and derivatives, the international banks game the system on behalf of themselves and select clients. It often seems their main products are hiding wealth and tax evasion. Deutsche Bank is only one of the many pirates now engaged in using Other People's Money to launder, evade, and generally reap criminal profit margins from traditional banking activities while passing off risks to unsuspecting customers and the world.
123
@SpeakinForMyself
ol' Wilbur Ross has his own bank in Cyprus.
Quick, point to Vanuatu on map.
whatever it takes to keep the casino open just a little while longer.
1
thank you, David Enrich. Quite a few of us have known this in bits and pieces of reporting over the last few years but now we have it in one report.
182
This excellent reporting is not the script; it’s only the treatment.
2
The extent of irresponsibility in the banking industry renders it’s warnings about Sanders and Warren moot. Maybe someone like Mike Bloomberg would straighten the industry out, but who could blame Sanders and Warren if they strangled it to death as the FED and Goldman and the masters of the Universe pay no attention to what amounts to Buccaneer Banking with Davos replacing Tortuga. “Too complex” for the public to understand, governments play along and have at this point surrendered under Trump. Bloomberg does understand and could be a formidable reformer should he win.
118
@Joseph Huben
Right on. Lots of fear of Sanders and Warren now, because one of them might be the next president. But Bloomberg could really blow things up. A Nixon going to China.
2
@Joseph Huben Warren is smart and knowledgeable enough to regulate, not strangle.
11
@Joseph Huben surely Elizabeth Warren has a better record of straightening out the industry than Michael Bloomberg - I'm not sure why you think someone who personally benefits from the current system would be a better choice than her for the job.
5
On the surface banking is simple- you make a loan and someone pays it back with interest. There is risk involved, either the borrower is a good credit risk or not.
Amazing the machinations the banks go through to make this straight forward business very complicated- apparently just making simple interest on some loans isn't enough- in the end a lot of it ends up as high stakes gambling.
65
Whenever someone invokes "the framers", it is important to remember that those wordsmiths could never have imagined the lifestyles and priorities of people like Trump. Modern finance is riddled with a plethora of inequities that allow many Americans so accumulate and retain massive wealth beyond the limits that were probably self evident in the previous century.
89
@Scott S
I suspect a lot of these transactions require computer technology to keep track of everything, and would have been impossible to keep track of in the founders'' day. Apparently the only founder who understood finance was Alexander Hamilton.
8
The framers knew people like that. King George of England, for one.
3
Thank you for doing the hard work of this analysis. I'd like to know who now owns these loans, and where they are based. I'll hazard a guess that the Saudi royal family has some connection, based on how Trump and his family fawn over them and do them favors with public funds and resources through our military. Who else? Russian oligarchs? People connected to Putin? Inquiring minds want to know. Thanks for helping more of us "follow the money."
482
@Dean
Follow the money is a marathon and this article is only out of the blocks and no where near a finish line. Well done framework for sure! We need to see a stark view of a conflict in interest which is another way of saying is who owns trump. We need to see the blue print to what for now has the appearance of a house of cards.
65
@ Dean
As long as Trump is President*, we’re on the hook.
10
I think that after three years of relentless analysis of Trump's past and present people are more interested in his future. How to bring an end to his reign as King of America and how to prevent someone else playing the same trick again.
Support for tyrants always seems legitimate and insurmountable at the time because it has the weight and force of the consensus of popular opinion but rats always desert a sinking ship and Trumps popular support will fall away rapidly when his usefullness to his backers ends.
161
In 100 years people will ask, Who is buried in Trump’s Tomb... and has the defaulted construction loan ever been resolved?
7
@Pottree : In 100 years earth is most likely long damaged beyond repair and we are no longer walking it....
2
This article is a public service. Complicated at first glance but very understandable when viewed through Trump's fear of banking records disclosure. You can smell the smoke and someday soon the incendiary discloses will occur.
495
@Doc:
"someday soon the incendiary disclosures will occur."
This is hopeful thinking, and applies when investigative agencies can access records.
If you don't know, look at trump's Executive Orders designed to help him "classify" his and his administration's corrupt/criminal activities (i.e. protect the evidences, under our "national secrets" system). He is having records destroyed, and for items he cannot have destroyed he is classifying them as "national secrets" using EO 13526 -- all to hide the most egregious records. He did that with the records of his infamous July call with President Zelensky. He is doing the same with many other records.
Those records will remain hidden, literally untouchable, for 25 years. Fewer than a dozen people on this planet will have access to his secrets, and if any disclosure will put that person at risk of prosecution for disclosing these real (but dubious) national secrets. He's a dirty person, who is hiding everything.
12
@Incredulous of 45 These records can be declassified by the next President
2
@Doc and Incredulous of 45
There's a whistleblower(s) in there somewhere.
1
Perhaps some Democratic senators could pressure Deutsche Bank to send Trump’s loan applications to them. They would most likely be co-signed by some Russian oligarch. After all, that would be perfectly legal, because it’s in the best interest of the United States.
144
This is the reason Trump favors Russia and Saudi Arabia. They bought Trump with cash. They own him. Literally. He will pay them back with political favors. It's that simple. Just like Trump.
1127
@Dr. Dan - comrade trump, in turn, has bought off
every republican politician who willingly accepted
campaign funding and signed Non Disclosure
Agreements. Mitt? Susan? Lamar? Lisa? et al.
41
@Dr. Dan Another possibility is that he got some loans from some very not-nice people via DeutscheBank, and he's paying those loans back with the various schemes that he's been using to transfer taxpayer money into his personal businesses.
In short, I'm not convinced his financial solvency or his political fortunes he's worried about. It might be his kneecaps, and/or the life of Tiffany or Barron.
31
With trump, the most egregious Quid Pro Quo's are yet to occur. They will occur, when he disastrously wins re-election (thanks Biden and Bernie for being so "cautious" to not harshly attack trump; we need Bloomberg who can and IS weakening trump)
Q: Why does trump cavort with criminal dictators like putin and bin salman and jong-un?
A: trump knows they will reward him for his "friendships"... by giving him lucrative financial rewards, along with the tallest buildings on which trump's name will shine, a mile high.
The narcissist needs to make his dead father love him.
That is the Only thing trump wants: to make himself adored (by all). He can do it. Even with no ability to do so legally.
13
The fact that Trump needed to take out a personal loan to pay back a $40 million loan guarantee, all the while claiming to be worth billions in the wake of multiple bankruptcies, is yet further evidence of just how much of a fraud and a failed businessman Trump is. True billionaires don’t struggle to pay $40 million loans.
Had Trump not received the equivalent of $400 million from his father decades ago, along with multiple bailouts from his father, the myth of Trump certainly wouldn’t exist.
This is why Trump is so threatened by Bloomberg. Bloomberg is truly self made and vastly more accomplished and successful than Trump. Bloomberg is the man Trump pretends to be.
973
@Mike Bonner - Yeah, but trump has mnuchin and
the US Treasury to empty.
32
This comment made my day. I hope enough Democratic primary voters will be able to see this as well. I'd love nothing more than to see a moral, effective real self-made billionaire take down the charade of one.
48
And Bloomberg is much shorter.
2
People love winners. Winners write laws. Laws determine winners. And the cycle repeats. And we wonder why people are again losing faith in governments? We all know where this is heading.
75
@Robert Black The characterization as a’winner’ brings to mind the adoration of the trump creature by the so called evangelicals! Somewhere in the Bible is a lesson about ‘ what good is it to gain all on earth , but not be able to enter heaven’! Not the quote, not even close but it captures the spirit of the biblical admonishion!
5
@Robert Black
Sadly, the people who lost faith in government placed in entirely the wrong place. The liar, cheat, conman they trusted is not cleaning things up, he is making it worse. The reckoning to come will not be at all pretty.
8
Enron, Wells Fargo, Tyco, Bear Sterns, Lehman and Deutsche Bank are just a few of the companies which employ tens of thousands of honest, hard working employees who are also victims of their top managements' shenanigans.
109
@R. Anderson
"tens of thousands of honest, hard working employees..."
are the enablers whose livelihoods are attached to company policy. They are shielded from responsibility courtesy of their mid-level positions and the top guys are shielded by their distance from day-to-day operations. They are victims by choice.
Responsibility evaporated, customers and the country fleeced, lots of money made..... and the regulating function of government is bled dry thanks to those tax cuts and a frozen GOP legislature.
6
Its quite simple really. Russian money flows to Deutsche Bank, from there money flows to trump. The loans are secured by credit lines.
Perfect, just like the phone call.
338
@Paul2
"The loans are secured by credit lines."
That makes no sense. A credit line is not an asset; it can't "secure" anything.
1
Deutsche Bank is a symptom of the massive problems inherent in our financial systems.
The bank could not have taken on the risks it has without the complicity of national governments. Until the egregious wrongs of crony capitalism are eradicated and so long as senior executives are not held accountable for their judgements, nothing much will change. Remember not a single financial executive went to prison for the massive fraud of the mortgage derivatives scandal of 2007/8.
The shielding of financial executives from accountability is not an outlier in crony capitalism, whether its practiced in the west or in Russia. Our congress and state legislatures are packed with politicians who are riddled with conflicts of interest spanning the gamut from nepotism, to post-office lobbying riches, to insider trading and the like.
Like Danny Devito and Donald Trump, they play rigged games with other people's money so they literally have no down side to their actions. All the politicians have to do is weather the occasional storm and the game goes on.
So that's what they do. So long as they give their constituencies what they want, they will persist. Doesn't matter the party. Neither party has any vested interest in truth or the law unless it benefits them personally or politically.
Just as true in Deutschland as it is in the US as it is in Russia.
64
The question this article does not answer is where Trump got the money to pay any of these loans back. Properties like Doral have not done well.
148
@bcw I suspect that his go to move was to use his properties as vehicles for money laundering from some of the most corrupt places on earth. That would explain his slobbering love of Putin and other Russian oligarchs.
26
“ Last April, congressional Democrats subpoenaed Deutsche Bank for its records on Trump, his family members and his businesses. The Trump family sued to block the bank from complying; after two federal courts ruled against the Trumps, the Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case, with oral arguments expected in the spring”
Trump and his family’s including Jared Kushner relationship with Deutsche Bank seems to be incredibly complicated and could take several years to figure out. An obvious question is why is the Trump family using the courts to block Congress from seeing the records?
258
@Javaforce
Isn’t it amazing how every time tries to find out the truth the Trumps try to block it. They love making money in the shadows and pretending they are clean in the light. It shows the love of money our society has that they can be successful at it, and even praised and supported by honest people.
26
Another telling of how the world turns on tickets to Trump's Big-Ride. Of how the fate of Americans is up for the big grab.
Excerpt: "Deutsche Bank’s relationship with Trump, rather than being an odd outlier, is a kind of object lesson in how the bank lost its way. The company was hungry for growth, especially in the United States, and it was happy to cozy up to clients that better-established players viewed as too damaged or dangerous. Along the way, it missed one opportunity after another to extricate itself from the Trump relationship or at least slow its expansion. With hindsight, the procession of miscues and bad decisions appears almost comical."
Substitute the Republican Party and the USA for Deutsche Bank in the above paragraph and you will arrive at the same conclusions. A safe bet is that all the secrets and illusions enabling Trump will prevail.
220
There is absolutely no rational reason for any bank (or, I would argue, any business at all) to become so large, so powerful, and so potentially destructive to the economy. In fact, were there not any kind of financial institutions of this size, banking or otherwise, we would likely have a very different world economy, likely one more reasonable, more equitable, and less amiable to supporting class structure.
But heaven forbid anyone say some entity cannot become filthy rich, regardless of risk to the rest of us.
196
@DKM
Well said. As you said, it's more than just banks. It is any business. Why is it that Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Facebook can get so large? Once they get the size of being a monopoly, then they turn to government to stifle innovation and competition to keep their "throne". Teddy Roosevelt wanted a level playing field between business, labor, and government.
9
@DKM The Occupy Movement had a good slogan: Too big to fail is too big to exist.
10
The real underlying issue is that while DB made the loans, rumor has it that like many banks, the loans were sold and are no longer held by DB.
It is quite possible that the Trump loans have been sold to certain Russian banks with dubious connections. Net net, the Russsian banks own Trumps debt and exercise a lot of direct and indirect control over Trump.
Further, the same oligarchs who own or control the Russian banks may be the source of capital for Trumps other assets.
He is in bed with some characters that he cannot afford to not pay.
There are many ways to compromise or control someone and owning their debt or financing their businesses outside the framework of the American legal system is very effective.
At the end of the day, you have one sketchy businessman borrowing from other sketchy businessman who always get their money back---one way or the other.
606
@BigBill
No one would buy Trump’s loans. Even the Russian mafia. If the loan is secured by real estate or by personal property, the entity buying the loan would have to file notices of the transfer in the appropriate public records office. Of course, the loans could have been transferred to a shell corporation, but I am pretty sure some journalist would have discovered the transfer. Trump is apparently such a huge “customer” of the bank that its securities filings with the SEC should reflect the sale of his loans because the sale would reduce DB’s exposure to a problematic borrower.
32
@Bathsheba Robie Someone did such an investigation. Buzzfeed reported that over 1,300 Trump owned and branded condos were sold to shell companies since the 1980s.
36
Ah, have you forgotten the Great Recession? DB can securitize the loan by selling bonds backed by the loan. So while the bank still holds the loan, it's still using someone else's money and passing off the risk.
19
Much of Trump’s complicated dealings with financial institutions were known well prior to the 2016 election. They should have been a serious political vulnerability for him. But, the DNC, in its infinite wisdom, promoted the one Democratic candidate that was rightly known as the First Lady of Wall Street. It’s pretty hard to mount an effective attack on a shady real estate developer’s questionable ties to Wall Street when you yourself are receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from these same firms for hour long speeches.
77
@Barrel
As if these are remotely comparable. Trump lied about his finances to the tune of $millions; Clinton was compensated for speeches made to Wall Street companies. You can argue that she was overcompensated (most paid speakers are), but it was not illegal. Purity politics is a losing proposition.
18
@Barrel
Receiving obscene amounts of money for a speech is not really much different in principle than $1000 or more a plate dinners which is quite common. And legal.
According to the article, some of what DB was illegal, but with underfunded, neutered regulatory agencies it got by. As long as you are making money in this country, especially oodles of money, we admire you.
8
@Barrel Oh, please. Comparing speaking fees to hundreds of millions of dollars in bad loans.
13
Thanks for this important work. Sadly, I'm guessing it isn't going to be widely understood. I still think there's some hidden Kgb underpinnings to Deutsche Bank...
259
Looks like the US Treasury has replaced Deutsche Bank for Trump’s high risk borrowing (1 trillion to finance the corporate and high earner tax cuts). As the much promised economic growth rates from these policies don’t occur, (see Fed’s latest forecasts) the taxpayers will finance this default for generations to come.
687
The economy began a free fall immediately after the inaugural. The abject poverty of the average person is tragic. Bernie or Bust!
12
@Fred:
Sadly, these "Bernie or Bust" people fail to see how they will (again) make trump win election.
The only democrat they want is Bernie. And not having Bernie means they don't want any other democrat either. They'd rather give the election to trump, by not voting for any other democrat.
How irresponsible of Bernie's Busters!
VOTE BLUE, NO MATTER WHO!
(and fund All Blue Senators... so that just in case trump wins, we can re-impeach him and then the Blue Senate can indict & remove trump)
13
@Steve R
"Looks like the US Treasury has replaced Deutsche Bank for Trump’s high risk borrowing "
I agree. It is remarkable to watch Trump undermine the US economy as he did with his businesses and Deutsche Bank (it may look good now, but with a debt bomb in the pipeline, dramatically reduced checks on the banking system, and an overpriced stock market, a correction is coming....). And he always gets away with leaving everyone else to pick up the cost. Quite extraordinary. I wonder if he will ever pay a price?
12