Did HSBC close my accounts after 20 years because I bought Swiss francs?

When Dan Strauss received a letter from HSBC stating that it would be closing his accounts after more than 20 years as a customer, he thought there had been some kind of mistake.

The voice over artist, who is 53 and lives in Cambridge, holds several accounts with the bank, including his main current and two savings accounts.

A few weeks ago he received a letter from the bank that read: “At HSBC we carry out regular reviews of the accounts, products and services we offer our customers.

“We recently reviewed your accounts and I am sorry to tell you that we are no longer able to provide you with banking products and services.”

He was granted two months to make alternative banking arrangements, but given no reason for why his 20-year relationship with the bank was being terminated.

Read on.

Trump Fights to Call Former Trump U. Students to Testify

SAN DIEGO (CN) — Donald Trump wants to call his own selection of former Trump University students to testify in a looming trial in San Diego Federal Court, and says a motion to bar him from doing so is “unprincipled.”
Trump filed a 22-page memorandum late Friday in support of being able to call former Trump University students as witnesses in Low v. Trump University, the older of two federal class-action cases against the Republican presidential nominee and his now-defunct real estate school.
The six-year-old case is scheduled to go to trial in late November following the presidential election.
Low and the other plaintiffs claim Trump scammed Trump University students out of thousands of dollars based off the claim they would learn his insider real estate secrets from instructors and mentors “handpicked” by Trump himself. But the “insider secrets” they doled out thousands for turned out to be nothing more than infomercial-quality advice, the students claim.
In his latest court filing, Trump claims a motion in limine filed by the plaintiffs seeking a blanket order from U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel excluding Trump from calling any former Trump University students as witnesses, except for class representatives in the lawsuit, “unprincipled and unsupported.”

Read on.

Michigan sets parole for ‘Linda Green’ robo-signer

And none of the bank execs responsible for the financial crisis are in prison..

The only person jailed in connection with a foreclosure forgery scandal that swept through Michigan and the rest of the country after the collapse of the housing bubble spends her days confined to the Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility in Pittsfield Township.

But not for long.

Sentenced in May 2013 to serve up to 20 years on racketeering charges, Lorraine Brown, now 55, will be paroled sometime this week, according to the Michigan Department of Corrections, after serving her 40-month minimum sentence. Brown will then be transferred to federal custody to serve the remainder of a 58-month federal sentence after pleading guilty to a single charge of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud.

Brown’s scheme netted $60 million between 2003 and 2006 for the parent company DocX, her Georgia-based document processing firm that forged more than 1 million foreclosure documents used by banks and attorneys to illegally turn homeowners homeless.

Read on.

Fed Wants $1.2M Fine, Ban For Ex-Barclays Forex Trader

Law360, New York (August 29, 2016, 3:00 PM ET) — Barclays PLC’s former global head of its foreign exchange spot business should be fined $1.2 million and banned from the banking industry after using chat rooms with competitors to manipulate the market, the Federal Reserve Board said Monday.

Christopher Ashton’s “personal dishonesty” and disregard for his employer constitute unsafe and unsound banking practices and a breach of fiduciary duty under the Federal Deposit Insurance Act, the board said in its notice. The London-based trader was fired in May 2015 for misconduct while the bank pled guilty to criminal…

Source: Law360