<story><title>&quot;Fake Chinese income&quot; mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks</title><url>https://www.thebureau.news/p/fake-chinese-income-mortgages-fuel</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ThisIsMyAltAcct</author><text>&amp;gt; The whistleblower, whom The Bureau is calling D.M., immigrated to Canada as an international student from India, making him a minority among mostly Chinese-Canadian co-workers at the Aurora branch.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; “I am going to reveal potential mortgage fraud at HSBC Bank Canada and possibly some employees benefited from the fraud, financially pocketing thousands of dollars, which I call the proceeds of crime.”&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; FINTRAC’s study doesn’t say that Canadian banks knowingly issued fake-income mortgages to Chinese diaspora buyers in Toronto. But in an interview, D.M. said banking staff are trained to guard against fraud, and the loan application packages he reviewed in Aurora beggared belief.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; The Bureau’s review of HSBC Canada emails and D.M.’s text messages, shows he came to believe numerous employees at the Aurora branch had direct knowledge of faked Chinese income mortgages, and a veteran manager with oversight of more than 10 Greater Toronto branches knew about broad and questionable mortgage lending for Chinese diaspora clients.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Pointing to specific examples, D.M. claimed that another branch colleague had admitted processing numerous loan applications without meeting his clients, because a branch manager delivered her subordinates foreign income client applications so “they did not have to get sales themselves.”&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; “She said yes, she knows specially in Mainland China there is a team who would even answer emails and phone calls verifying [Chinese income] but it’s a sophisticated and well organised scam,” D.M. &amp;#x27;s email to HSBC Canada managers says. [...] “When I asked for such a serious issue if she raised a HSBC confidential [complaint] or not she evaded my question,” D.M. wrote. “Now we all love numbers, but I don&amp;#x27;t think the bank will like these kinds of numbers achieved through this way.”&lt;p&gt;Sounds like that branch is compromised</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>topspin</author><text>&amp;gt; Sounds like that branch is compromised&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;Since 2015, the whistleblower concluded, more than 10 Toronto-area HSBC branches had issued at least $500-million&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s not &lt;i&gt;a&lt;/i&gt; branch.  It&amp;#x27;s the whole bank.  And you can safely infer it&amp;#x27;s not the &lt;i&gt;only&lt;/i&gt; bank.</text></comment>
<story><title>&quot;Fake Chinese income&quot; mortgages fuel Toronto real estate bubble: HSBC bank leaks</title><url>https://www.thebureau.news/p/fake-chinese-income-mortgages-fuel</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ThisIsMyAltAcct</author><text>&amp;gt; The whistleblower, whom The Bureau is calling D.M., immigrated to Canada as an international student from India, making him a minority among mostly Chinese-Canadian co-workers at the Aurora branch.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; “I am going to reveal potential mortgage fraud at HSBC Bank Canada and possibly some employees benefited from the fraud, financially pocketing thousands of dollars, which I call the proceeds of crime.”&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; FINTRAC’s study doesn’t say that Canadian banks knowingly issued fake-income mortgages to Chinese diaspora buyers in Toronto. But in an interview, D.M. said banking staff are trained to guard against fraud, and the loan application packages he reviewed in Aurora beggared belief.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; The Bureau’s review of HSBC Canada emails and D.M.’s text messages, shows he came to believe numerous employees at the Aurora branch had direct knowledge of faked Chinese income mortgages, and a veteran manager with oversight of more than 10 Greater Toronto branches knew about broad and questionable mortgage lending for Chinese diaspora clients.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Pointing to specific examples, D.M. claimed that another branch colleague had admitted processing numerous loan applications without meeting his clients, because a branch manager delivered her subordinates foreign income client applications so “they did not have to get sales themselves.”&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; “She said yes, she knows specially in Mainland China there is a team who would even answer emails and phone calls verifying [Chinese income] but it’s a sophisticated and well organised scam,” D.M. &amp;#x27;s email to HSBC Canada managers says. [...] “When I asked for such a serious issue if she raised a HSBC confidential [complaint] or not she evaded my question,” D.M. wrote. “Now we all love numbers, but I don&amp;#x27;t think the bank will like these kinds of numbers achieved through this way.”&lt;p&gt;Sounds like that branch is compromised</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>radicaldreamer</author><text>Are US banks just a lot more strict about source of income than Canadian banks?</text></comment>