Singapore, China and a $2 Billion Money Laundering Scandal
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.พ. 2024
- Singapore has long been a haven for the super wealthy, with its low taxes, safety and stability.Threatening to upend that carefully crafted image, however, is a sprawling $2.2 billion money laundering scandal. Though the vast majority of investment in the city-state is above board, its famous openness to inflows is now under scrutiny.
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Singaporeans do this all the time
I'm Singaporean, and I'm really mad at this. So much dirty money passing through my country, and I don't even get a cut.
😂😂😂😂
Didn't you already received your Government cash vouchers and rebates? That is effectively your share of the cut, from the revenues earned
This video was made by bloomberg. A democrat in the USA. Is there a reason he is saying Singapore has dirty money when Jeffrey Epstein laundered 10X this much money inside the USA? and got away with it for 30 years until Trump called his bluff?
Get in on it, facilitate some
It used for drug money
This is nothing. Don't forget that for a century or more, Switzerland specialized in coaching & helping customers evade taxes of other countries and helped by hiding their money in secret accounts.
i wonder if CERN is another money laundering, they cool nevertheless
Well its nothing is it, big money is moving. Bigger money might be else where, but its not invalid.
@@harry797442 The point is that corruption is a fact of life everywhere and there are much bigger fish in Switzerland and especially where most of the dirty money is - in the US which has an abundance of financial crime whilst hypocritically exempting itself from regulations that it imposes on all other nations vis a vis US citizens, for example FATCA.
Same as London.
whataboutism comment right here
That's why, in May 2023, a group from the Cayman Islands went to Singapore and Hong Kong. They aimed to make progress in opening an office in either city. The Cayman Islands are trying to keep up with Singapore and Hong Kong, which are becoming popular places for Asia's hedge funds and wealthy people to keep their money.
How is HSBC not involved?!😂
And they don't realize Credit Suisse is long no more.
HSBC shifted their headquarters to London a while back. They doubled down on their British structure when Xi & the CCP started absorbing and governing Hong Kong.
2B is way too small...
@@wolfbane8290 That's symbolic HQ. The function HQ is in HK. Asia has more people, economy, and wealth than the rest of the world combined today. The entire real UK economy is smaller than several Chinese *cities* lol. HSBC is mostly in Asia, focused on Asia, and rapidly closing throughout the west. HSBC bank recently left US and Canada.
Because of US sanctions. As long as the transactions are conducted in USD whether the transaction took place in Singapore or elsewhere, the bank will be fined in millions of $$$. And HSBC has been fined heftily before 🤣Also, do you still remember Huawei’s Meng case? HSBC had to expose her otherwise the bank would be in deep trouble 🤣
In March of 2006 I was in the DBS Bank on Orchard Rd in Singapore. A guy from China was was also waiting for a bank agent to serve him. He opened his bag and proceeded to pull out brick after brick of Chinese 100 yuan notes. He had no less than 2 dozen of these stacks of cash. Later I estimated that each stack was 100,000 yuan for a total of around $75,000USD. I asked my real estate agent who was helping me find an apartment. She said mainlanders routinely bring wads of cash into Singapore. In fact she had helped a 12 year old Chinese mainland boy rent an apartment as his parents had sent him to Singapore to attend school. He arrived alone by plane with a similar bag full of cash. Corrupt banking involving illicit money is as common as a bowl of steam boat or curry crab.
Precisely, Singapore is the World's rank 3rd Important Financial Centre, becos of such incredible efficiency to deal with Depositors' / Investors' monies; CASH / BANK DRAFTS / SWIFT REMITTANCES / Foreign Currencies futures / trading etc. etc. Personally, also encountered to declare CASH equivalent amount of SGD20,000 /- higher to ICA officers, at Singapore Airport, with documentations/source of the origin of the CASH and purpose of such importation. Actually, myself finding your story of a local bank, DBS Bank accepting stacks and stacks and stacks of Chinese Yuan 100 Cash notes making deposits, seemingly not possible, as if not mistaken, Singapore DBS Bank, does not accept direct physical Foreign Currency CASH bill notes deposits, only in Singapore Dollars Bill Notes. Are sure of this re-collection, or mistaken in Hong Kong, the Branch of DBS Bank there ??. Or the Chinese National observed, were depositing Stacks of Singapore 100 bill notes, where its orange color may be mistaken for the pink colored Chinese Yuan 100 bill notes?
@@Fr.VeniceLAI LOL you mean crooks. LKY and the whole lot of them are corrupt. Prostitution is rampant in SG, just go to Geylang and see it on the streets.
Curry crab is quite hard to find.
Lol just make things up
Cute story, but that didn't happen. You can't bring in bags of cash into retail banks, this is not a cartoon.
Without dirty money, Singapore will collapse. Same with other financial centres.
and those from Indonesia, Russia, and the Middle East😅
Songapore GDP is inflated by these dubious financial transaction and services...its manufacturing and service sectors are too small to make up its GDP. Despite its gdp per capita its ordinary citizens purchasing power is not much different from its neighbours middle class.
If the system managed to pick it up, and the authorities acted on it, to me that means the system is working. What is Singapore without their credibility? That's their biggest currency, after all. I think the problem for SG authorities is trying to trace down the illicit gains of wealth without, ruffling the hairs of some very important people in - for example - the Communist Party of China.
They want to clean up shop, but not upset a key trading partner
For every case opened and prep caught, how many gone under the radar. 1MDB scandal went through Singapore banking system and no one is charged.
Greetings from Singapore. The chinese government does NOT nor need to launder profits via Singapore; it just brings them to China and buys gold. That's why China has 200K metric tons of audited physical gold today worth $18-trillion, more than all other countries combined.
@@davidrichards1741 you’re looking at it wrong. Not the CCP as its own, whole entity. But certainly individuals who’ve benefited from any position they may hold within the Party
@@CameronAdamsify Possibly so but this pales compared to the corruption, bribery, and illegal insider trading conducted bu US politicians. Nancy pelosi is a half-billiionare on an $80K svg lifetime salary, Obama owns two $16M houses after lifetime earnings of $3.2M before tax, etc. The list is endless and it doesn't add up, does it.
based on your logic the system will always be working to you, because if it doesnt pick it up you wouldnt know
What Singapore is to mainlanders now is essentially HK 10 to 15 years ago. Singapore needs to learn the lesson of HK.
If the dirty money flowing through Singapore somehow helps to expand their economy, then I'm afraid I fail to see how the government would enforce any measures that at face value could negatively affect their economic growth.
I agree.
SIn has always depended on foreign money.
Thing is though, Singapore built its reputation as 1 of Asia's cleanest places to do business, so having such a thing like this happening is an incredible stain on the country, especially considering the sheer scale of what was uncovered.
I'm more of the view that they will try and stamp this out very hard and close the loopholes that were used to facilitate this whole operation because not doing so would significantly reduce Singapore's standard in the world of finance and business, which in turn could lead to investments being channeled elsewhere.
@@Unazaki
It's all smoke and mirrors.
its worked pretty well for UK
Same as London in the UK
They knew abt this kind of dirty money all along. The Indonesians hv been doing this before the mainlanders came. The decision to zoom in came only when the price is right.
Indonesian chinese you mean. Not all Indonesians are rich la
The world's most efficient laundromat - Singapore.
"The issue is, Singapore operates with strict governance, limiting public dissent, which has led to concerns when it comes to purchasing property or a vehicle."
yes
When was this mentioned in the video? O.o
Based.
The $2B money laundering case shows Singapore 🇸🇬 is a haven for Chinese money laundrers.
This is only a floating part of an iceberg.
Inaccurate. Money laundering is big for Chinese in the Americas as well.
@@mingzmings88Any report on what you said or you are just trying to smear?
@@AhmetTekin101 plenty of reports. physical laundering of humans too.. say what you? Smearing?
@@AhmetTekin101 plenty of reports out there dude. There are actual laundering of physical human beings too in particular the prcs.. what say U? Smearing what?
The Singaporean government had known about Chinese 🇨🇳 money laundering organizations operating in Singapore 🇸🇬 for a long time but *quietly looked the other way.*
- Singapore only started investigating them when there were reports circulating around in the West.
Oh and we should believe you😂
@@NewmaticKeWho's "we"? The Chinese?
And we should listen because lastChang represents the pinnacle of truth and impartiality 🤣
...wait...wait... wait... people are JUST figuring this out?
Nice work!
Jeffrey Epstein laundered 10X as much money and influence through the USA banking system. Where is the bloomberg special on that
7:17 "so we have to ask ourselves, what can we do better?" that's what I love to hear. Unlike Germany where people tend to use weaker and poorer countries as examples to say they're doing better than them. If you're number 1 in the world, you can still do better and remain number 1.
From this report it's obvious they are not poor. At all. Why can they have many children while the West are continuing abortions ? Noticed the differences ???...
People are sickened...until they are bought.
The system is running at par, maybe better. It's got one of the best bank secrecy laws in the world, that's how they keep the country so well maintained. It's Asia's Swiss, what do you expect.
No wonder mainlanders are parking their families and wealth in SG. Pity the locals, though.
There is a belief among responsible tax professionals in Australia that any client whose money is coming from Singapore should be heavily scrutinised or better be avoided. They know the Australian Tax Office will put an end to their professional career if something goes wrong.
Yet among all corruption index around the world Australia always ranked lower than Singapore lol
Yet the US has by far the most dirty money & corruption in the world. The entire continent of Latin America, Central America, plus all the corrupt US politicians launder many trillions yearly in the US, which refuses to comply with standard CRS, AML, AEOI global standards agreed on by all other nations, because the US knows almost all its cash inflows is dirty but US needs it to stay financially afloat.
@@Thekidisalright Yet Singapore is always ranked lower than New Zealand. So what? Neither Australia nor New Zealand is acting like we're better. The dodgy elements are still there hiding in plain sight in Singapore. You can act like rest of the world doesn't notice crime in Singapore, but it does.
Cringe u can’t name 5 that think that LOL acting like most of the money in singapore is dirty
@@commentatorxyz5514 In fact there's more crime in Australia in a week than there is in Singapore in a year. Reutrn it to its rightful owners.
There is no such thing as non dirty money, only legalised crime.
🥱🥱
Just too expensive living there. Look at the property prices
Singapore is a sunny place for shady people. Banking system cracks down on small operators, but lets big corrupt fish swim freely in their system. Terrible place for international banking for anyone with less than a few billion who can bribe government officials for a few million. Singapore officials don't care if they are catering to the worst people in the world, as long as they keep 10 figures in the banking system.
You have no idea what your talking about.
@@tjm2218 please provide evidence. COE $100k, Honda Accord over $200k. Actual price is $250k USD. Banking, try to open international account with less than $10 mil, no chance. $100 mil + banks will charter private jets. This is Singapore.
The toilets are clean but money is dirty.
@@tjm2218 So innocent. So cute.
Singapore not wanting dirty money is like people wanting to stop eating food. If some of them cause you harm you bin them. Others you keep enjoying and eating.
Singapore's thirst for money is known. It is a business country rather than just a country, unlike US or China. It opens up to anyone who can throw money into the country. Hope the money laundering issue can wake up these bunch of politicians to look more into this open economy.
Someone did say he’d welcome billionaires to Sg. How would his underlings take to his wish?
one coin has two sides, letting money flowing in def. attracts money laundry or "dirty" money.
SIN now finds it made a deal with the D*vil?
Above board or Under board, still uses the same board, by simply flipping over.
yes
If you need to wash the dirtiest money you go the best laundromat ie one with most restrict AML policy. Looks like someone was sleeping.
yes
PR Control or PR Spin? but to whose advantage?
singapore has always looked the other way to foreign money, no questions asked. this is nothing new. im surprised this news broke - or allowed by the government to be mentioned.
Money from mainland china make Singapore more expensive for the local people to keep up prices of housing skyrocketing .in the 8:56 end, Singaporean cannot afford to buy affordable houses for low and middle income group. No matter how smart pm or policy maker , please don't go to Singapore invest.
very rare to read comments like yours.. but it must be exposed singapore is just a refugees country from china, criminals escape to. so beware.
Isn't that how Singapore maintained its status?
exactly. it's "don't ask, don't tell". not sure why this case was made public in the first place cause it's just the norm
@@9razzler9 It's advertisement, "we are open for business"
@@adamchan1998 🤣🤣🤣
@@adamchan1998😂😂 they are way too lenient in Singapore with foreign money 😂
So what happens to all the money & assets the Singapore government confiscated? Are they going to be returned/shared to the people and developments or just kept for the authoriteies own use? People need more transparency
What do you think? The government is angry not because bad people abused their system to profit, but rather because they didn't get a cut of those wealth obviously
What a very light sentence
Dirt is everywhere. It's how the cleaning is being done that's important. This is an open country and therefore its hospitality can be abused.
Is there a commonality between the perpetrators of these dirty illicit activities?
Asking for a friend .
I’m not into finance but any ordinary people can see that a sizable amount of money in the global finance system is a dirty money, I’d say 10-20%. In Singapore’s case, you can’t filter all the predators in the ocean.
It is more than that. Cause it is mainly investment based country
The worst of all by far is the US. Becuase nothing there is enforced or reported. The US is the only nation to not report accounts but it forces all other countries to report all data to the US. Hypocrites as usual. US also refuses to comply with international CRS, AML, and AEOI standards that almost all other nations have agreed to.
Many colluded.
Zaobao has published dentical columns as the China Daily, blurring the line between Chinese 🇨🇳 state media and this privately held Singaporean 🇸🇬 newspaper.
I assure you nobody young reads zaobao. The chinese textbooks are enough. As for the older generation, they are already mostly pro china.
@@take2762Yeah, but why Singapore allows that?
Yes agreed
Thats the whole idea of printing the SGD$10.000 bill.
That old dude on the bicycle might have simply been on his way from his penthouse in Marina One get lunch at One Raffles Place.
You never know. Probably the mastermind behind it all. That's why never get caught.
Amazing
yes
always remember money makes the world go round, so it's either you ride with the wave or go against it.
What about kleptocrats from neighbouring countries? Sarawak ministers for example.
True.
...or Suharto?
yup, they keep their stash in SG. Very secure & safe,
1.5 trillion of 'investment' in 2022 - is that just foreign money parked in banks or is there actual productive investment in Singapore's economy? Being a financial warehouse provides little toward the broader economy beyond a small numbet of ppl working for financial institutions.
All the world's major financial and banking centers have the same problems. Name one for me that is better. They are incentivized to bank with dirty money, and their vibrant economies depend on it. There is no upside for cracking down. They always rationalize to their conscience and moral bearing, if any left, like drug cartels that if I don't do it someone else would. I am not making excuse for Singapore, but just stating the fact.
Is there a Bloomberg series on other financial centres like London and New York?
Only $2.2 billion? Try London
A conservative estimate that £100 billion is washed through London every year
Credit Swiss bank just can’t escape from any scandals hahaha
Every financial hub has dirty money flowing through it. A minute video that somehow managed to say nothing.
It's similar to Switzerland and Panama
At least the over $2B were actually gained from the exchange of goods or services, where there are mostly proponents whom got what they paid for illegal or not, and those gains would flow back into the economy anyway- whereas $2.6B in Malaysia... lol I dont think we need a further description of what happened there.
The way says its his system and NOT "our" or "Singapore's" at 07:54 shows the impression as if that the country only belongs to them. Best to say our system instead of just my system.
I think you might be projecting a little here. The government runs and implements a system to run the country, so he may be referring to it as a system that he put in place
WHAT!!?? USD$2b only??!! In Vietnam, a well known Vietnamese businesswoman fraudulently took USD$44b‼️😳
Heard about that case, but i thought it was just $18b, do you mind enlightening me 😂
Why do you think Singapore home and car prices are amongst the highest in the world!😂
Car prices yes, home not even close to many nations.
Besides money laundering, China has been using Singapore 🇸🇬 as a cover for its operations in other countries, including:
- getting around US semiconductor restrictions and
- hiding affiliation with the Chinese regime.
U don’t know anything bot
Not surprising from a place once known released a 10000 Singapore Dollar banknote. I mean, that's a very HUGE amount of money in a single banknote.
These notes are harder to use in the real world. Long time ago when my mom brought me to the bank, she deposited $10K notes and she is required to bring her identification card as well as verify where the funds are sourced from. If anything, these are sort of a "trap" for money launderers.
Switzerland of Asia
And the Swiss aren't clean either.
@@RUHappyATM it may have been a decade ago. Nowadays not anymore.
Cannot agree more.
@@RUHappyATM I really dislike when USA and their media go around the world pointing finger at "dirty money states" while being themself the biggest "dirty money state". Cheers from Switzerland.
And USA?
Look even Singapore has such cases. In other countries we can improve our lives too.
Malala and Java have the most dangerous climate and tectonic position on the planet. Nothing like Hong Kong or Singapore. Maybe new Clark City in -Louisiana- Luzon is the answer for room to move.
Wherever there is financial crimes, you can be sure that Switzerland's name will come up for sure.
Singapore - an Asian Switzerland.
Family Office - Govt Endorsed Shell Company
That's like all the financial institutions and they want to blame crypto, they are just as dirty.
do a similar report on london and swiss money launderers through off shore tax heavens of british common wealth islands
Temasek Holdings?
What do you do with the billions? Please distribute to the poor community…..it’s not a legal earnings so the gov shouldn’t keep them as this are unethical, is like robbing
I thought this is Singapore main attraction..... Swiss do this too right......
That tiny winy island is filled with Greed
Ha ha imagine how many of these been going on for years until now
I thought Singapore does not have corruption problem.
Anti corruption is exactly why this case got cracked down.
Where iswaran?
i'm not surprise.
Singapore does not have natural resources and depend on high FDI to grow the economy. That's why DBS was fined over S$1 million for being tied to the 1MDB money laundering case
Singapore so stringent and calling itself a financial hub.
How could it be a laundering hub.
Already 1MDB a big deal now this one a syndicated .... who else involved....
How such a large amount go undetected. A big fish ...:or fishes....
I wish my country would prosecute these things. For us it's business as usual.
Do you really think all these people that are caught have these kind of money? There are top or higher rank/company behind all this money laundering cases. These is a large sum you are talking about.
In every country facing lot of problem . Rich growth richer but middle and lower case become poor , Because of house rent increases. The government ownt take steps its becoming biggest fall of the richest cities . House renting rise every thing becomes rice .
I'm amazed at how well Singaporean officials speak English very well. Is this the case for ordinary people too? Bc in some countries people who hold important positions in the politics cannot even neatly speak their own languages.
our working language is English
If one undergoes 16 years of education in the sciences and humanities with English as the language of instruction and still has problems speaking English competently then something is very wrong.
Yes, we do speak like that unless we want to speak in our street lingo, Singlish.
@TheMrleeyang Didn't know that, thanks.
Singapore was a British colony. When it gained independence, its leaders decided on English as a common working language amongst its multi-racial population.
2 billion dollar? Wow almost 1/1000 of what the US spends on the military
This is nothing compared to the money laundering in Gibraltar.
These are not criminals, because gambling is not a crime. Where is the victim?
Its illegal bcos gov cannot tax u.
The title is very misleading. While all the alleged criminals are Chinese or were Chinese, the dirty monies come from Myanmar and Cambodia, which organized crime organization operate illegal activities from.
Illegal Online gambling and Fraud, stealing money from mobile banking app should be arrested !
London, New York are all the same so I would not be throwing too many stones in your glass houses
1:41
The young male reporter in the video Low De Wei is fresh out of school in 2021 with barely any solid real world working experience - I certainly wouldn’t see much credibility in his schoolboy “expert analysis” of such a complex subject.
very rare to read comments like yours.. but it must be exposed singapore is just a refugees country from china, criminals escape to. so beware. I
t's n ot complex at all.Songapore is a cari makan island with limited natural and human resources. A survival island where criminals come to make money. Who gonna stop them?
This would have been a more impactful story if the example was more concerning. People who run an online gambling company doesn’t seem dangerous or corrupt.
This is ASIAN gambling, not hollywood style cosmo drinking martini shaking gambling that the west has an image of.
This is what happens when people only care about money
Cars arent even beneficial in the first place. Two cents
Gambling is a disease that destroyed so many family mostly from poor background. That's why our government (Indonesia) ban gambling including online betting. But the online casinos found their safe heaven in Singapore, operate from there but targeting surrounding countries poor people. Its really frustrating. Come on Singapore, you already so rich. Do not help to destroy the life of poor people in other countries.
Ever heard of personal responsibility? People who want to gamble will always find casinos, especially on the Internet. It is not the casino that is a disease, but the lack of self-control and discipline.
@@huckleberryfinn6578will you say the same thing about drugs?
@@GPAnims how are drugs similar? You mean it can be consumed just by going online?
They should back to Malaysia.
Young, make a lot of money and end up in jail for the rest of life. What a wastefull
They not only scam ur country ..they also scam in malaysia country ..
From Hong Kong to Singapore to finally Darwin.
Everyone in their street know their country are money laundry center only the authority don't know or pretend noting happen
For more than 100 years Switzerland was the bank haven for Cartels and criminals and nobody talked about it. In contrary, Singapore proactively goes after dirty money and managed to catch such a huge criminal networks and yet Bloomberg call it Singapore Dirty Money Problem!
The media bias towards successful Asian nations like Singapore and shoving problems of west (Crime, Wokeness, Education quality drop etc) under the carpet is disgusting.
From 4 to 20... +79% ? Lol you should go to school my lady... Its 600%... Its not a rule of third...
Money from China