U.S. Banks, Including Chase and Synchrony, File Suspicious Activity Reports and Shut Down Accounts for ‘Logging in From Another Country’ and Transferring Retirement Funds; May Also Affect VPN Users

U.S. Banks, Including Chase and Synchrony, File Suspicious Activity Reports and Shut Down Accounts for ‘Logging in From Another Country’ and Transferring Retirement Funds; May Also Affect VPN Users

American banks are closing customer accounts without warning and many are refusing to say why.

The ones named, according to the article, are Chase and Synchrony Bank.

(Two of the worst banks in the country to bank with, I might add. Chase was ripping my ex blind with $11 monthly “checking account fees” until I switched him to an online bank with no fees and put an end to that.)

Synchrony is an underlying bank for “PayPal Savings” and “PayPal Checking.

Synchrony also runs some store cards. They have a possibly illegal practice (under Illinois BIPA) of collecting biometric data to open an Amazon Card.

If you use a VPN, you may want to use “split tunneling” for a Web browser session to do your online banking.

In at least one instance, according to the article, Chase Bank violated the Bank Secrecy Act, first by telling a man who had his accounts frozen in the middle of dinner and was left unable to pay the bill as a result, that it had filed a SAR (which is illegal….you cannot tell a customer you did that), and then violated the BSA again by telling him why (he had logged on to their online banking system from a foreign country while he was on vacation).

There’s a lot of weird stuff going on in the US banking industry right now, including an explosion of SARs. Ironically, the article says the explosion of SARs came “after the pandemic”, which was a pandemic of a SARS virus. 🙂

In all seriousness, the banks are reporting anything that looks even kind of dodgy, apparently, because there’s no penalty to the bank to close accounts and file them, even though only 4% are possibly criminal activity, according to the New York Times article.

MinceR on #TechRights IRC channel raised a very good point.

Isn’t losing clients a penalty?

Chase Bank has $4 trillion in assets. With that much and with the “Systemically Important Bank” regulators breathing down their necks, it’s not so serious if they start cutting some “risky” clients loose even if they’re not actually all that risky.

Smaller banks that need the deposits more (like $100-200 billion in assets) and don’t have the intense SIB regulations are probably more likely to look the other way on some of this, but I don’t know that.

Besides, there are risks at banking with one where less eyes are on them, like all those California Tesla “loaners” who came to bang on the window of the failed SVB thinking you can go to a failed bank and walk out with a briefcase and a million dollars cash. They found this out.

Big banks treat you like shit, because they’re huge and they don’t need your weekly paycheck from cleaning the hospital that much, and small banks, well…. Who even knows what’s going on in there?

You takes your chances… As the saying goes.

The man who banked at Synchrony (super sketchy bank) had another problem.

He dumped out his 401(k) into Synchrony and then tried to open another IRA at TD, which is not suspicious or illegal….people close retirement accounts and transfer the money into a new one all the time….the IRS even says you HAVE TO within the same tax year to avoid penalties!

When he went to open the new IRA at TD and fund it, again, perfectly legal, people do it every day, Synchrony froze his account, took his money, wouldn’t tell him why, and said “We’ll get back to you within 60 days.”

Uh huh….

Purchasing Certificates of Deposit to Hedge Against Inflation (And a Little More.)

Today I got a letter from my bank in an email.

They said I could get a fairly good (4.75%) rate on an 11 month no-penalty CD.

I’ve never bought CDs before. I have some Treasury Bonds that I bought last year while inflation was raging and before the Federal Reserve raised rates pretty high.

Now, if I buy new Series I Savings Bonds they only start out paying 6.48%.

They do have a higher interest rate than the no penalty CD, but the bonds are less liquid.

If I buy a bunch of bonds and need the cash, there’s just no way to get that back out of the Treasury Direct account until 12 months have gone by, and there’d be a 3 month interest penalty if I didn’t wait 5 years.

So going forward on fixed-income investments for now, I still want to play it safe and will tolerate this slightly lower rate of return lending my money to the bank.

I only have to let them hold it for 7 days each time I buy a CD and then I can cash it all out, with interest, and no harm done, if the SHTF later and I need access to a lot of money.

The news says that people are yanking their bank deposits and going “all in” on Treasury Notes, but to be honest, today’s rates on Treasury Securities are just not blowing my skirt up considering the kind of liquidity I want out of this.

I’m going the opposite direction and doing bank deposits now because they’re still very liquid and earning “enough”.

What disasters could be out there? I don’t know. There’s Corporate America, even Walmart(!) doing mass layoffs while the government and the new lie to everyone to keep them calm and under control.

There’s the fact that the Republicans in Congress (seem to be) serious about defaulting on the national debt and playing “Who gets screwed the worst?” and their plan is to pay China. They’re planning to prioritize payments to China. What do you think they’re going to do with your Savings Bonds?

My reading of the SVB, Silvergate, and Signature collapse is that the government must be broke as Hell because when have you ever seen the US federal government tell the bankers and the investors in those banks that they’re going to eat their own shit instead of Congress bailing them out and borrowing from China to do it?

I was reading an article about Crocs (the alleged shoes) today that I was sharing with Roy in TechRights IRC.

In this article, a woman was boasting about how many pair of Crocs she owned and how she was getting her kids into it too. Just hundreds of Crocs. The Imelda Marcos of Crocs, I guess. Imelda on TikTok with Crocs.

I started thinking to myself “Goddamn these people are dumb.” because when you lose your job in the mass layoffs that both are and are not happening, what will you pay your bills with?

I doubt your landlord or the supermarket wants your blinged out pile of Crocs.

So I’m in a holding pattern with my savings.

The stock market hasn’t returned anything significant in a long time. I read another article that Americans are tearing into their retirement accounts, and are projected to drain $750 billion of their retirement money and their children’s birthrights to buy, Crocs and standing two hours in each line at Disney World, I guess?

You can’t replace actual fiscal security with trinkets and “experiences”.

I don’t know what kind of experience Disney is these days. I’ve heard from other people who are still paying the prices, which have quadrupled since I was there, along with the lines, that the “magic” is gone. I talked to Roy about this too. How in the 90s, when the US was a largely middle class country with opportunities, and Disney was an affordable getaway. It was pricey, sure, but it wasn’t like $8,000 for a couple of weeks.

That’s before you even get me started on what a fascist dump Florida itself is, with Ron DeMentis down there trolling people. You don’t want my gay tourist money? That’s fine.

Tour your own state! Illinois may not have a lot of star attractions, but it has nice things to do, and can be very economical.

I do know one thing. I’d much rather be hiking than standing in line in some increasingly sketchy theme park, in the middle of America’s Russia, with swamp ass, paying $20 for a hotdog.

Anyway, so some of my family members are at Disney World as I write this.

They go 2-3 times a year. Meanwhile, back in reality, people are standing outside the local conviction mill, I mean debtors prison, I mean, totally fair US court operated under the highest standards of legal ethics in the world, waiting to take their turn for garnishment. They’re in Florida not even bothering to defend themselves, so each of the “creditors” just takes turns getting whatever it wants in default judgments.

(I don’t know if they have any Crocs though.)

In this environment, I have just totally clamped up except my continued vice of going out to eat, on my restaurant rewards credit card (which I pay off immediately, and usually only if there’s another special coupon offer).

I’ve been tapping into those gas rewards apps, like Upside, and stacking my gas credit card on top, so I get about 7% on that back.

Then I have a 2% on everything card, for the other bills.

If you do it right, the rewards from the credit card schemes (which are typically funded by people paying cash and not paying their cards off…but don’t hate the player, hate the game!) will go right back into your Savings account and help fund more Savings Bonds or CDs.

When you cushion yourself with savings, and life happens, it’s more like pulling out your checkbook and gritting your teeth instead of sweating bullets. Where you’ll die if they cut your spouse’s hours this week or if the dog gets sick. (Or if you get sick.)

You should never ever spend money unless you are just overflowing with savings and have no debts, and then maybe if you want to splurge a bit. Many people in America don’t want to do any of the hard work so when they’re in debt and they want to spend, they just take on more debt.

I mean, Congress is talking about taking a meat cleaver to Social Security and Medicare and they’re not even being subtle about it, and here’s all these people about to drain $750 billion from their retirement accounts so they can stand in line to go on whatever they’re calling Splash Mountain now.

Congress isn’t even hiding that they don’t care if you die in old age from running out of money, and we’re off to see some sweaty pervert in a mouse costume.

Roy and I talked some about SVB going under.

All those people driving up in Teslas (keeping up appearances) to bang on the glass of a failed bank.

My opinion, not Roy’s, is that being based in California and some of the “DEI” crap on their Web site was the first clue that the bank was up to some sketchy shit.

A bank should make profit and protect depositors. Not throw $75 million at a bail “charity” that springs murderers and people who torch my spouse’s workplace and run out with some televisions.

I keep my money in FDIC insured accounts, at a well capitalized bank, that doesn’t charge fees, and has assets underneath the bank that I am fairly confident in.

I’m not really getting the vibe that this bank is under-capitalized, stupidly managed, has millions going out the door for liberal hogwash, etc. If it was, 100% of my money is in the statutorily defined deposit insurance limit, and would be available to me again days later.

To an extent, we’re all at the mercy of others.

In my case, usually people who are over-educated in all of the ways that don’t apply to a life situation and want their student loans forgiven while they drive to a failed bank in a Tesla to bank on the glass. That’s in-between trips to Disney.