Rietumu - for all victims of fraudulent account closure and theft of funds

[Martin Everson]

They are delaying giving you back your money on purpose as they will need your money it for a bail-in. Secondly it is normal to delay outflows as much as possible to maintain solvency in such a situation. If everybody moves their money to another bank then the bank will be bankrupt overnight like ABLV.

Be happy if you get 100k back via he EU Deposit Guarantee Scheme (DGS)

Advice:

If you are unable to withdraw your money then see if you can ask your RM if you can invest the excess over 100k QUICKLY into stocks or bonds that are not issued by the bank. At lSecurities/Custody account cannot be touched by any bail-in or bankruptcy of the bank ;-) Those assets in a portfolio become segregated from the banks assets and do not form part of any bail-in or bankruptcy. Hence why the rich dump their cash into short term government treasuries even if it has a negative yield. Loosing 0.5% per a year on a negative yielding government bond is better than loosing 100% (-100k EU insured amount) to a bank collapse.

To anyone else.....NEVER keep large amounts of cash in excess of 100k in any EU bank. Always buy short term safe government bonds with excess (i.e Germany, Netherlands) even if bond is negative yielding. That way you are covered in case of any bank collapse

 

[adrian]

What's the procedure with Ombudsman. I have account at rietumu and they frozen my account too. I am opened to join the group that sue rietumu.

 

[Flxy]

Martin,

Mostly agree. However, there are still ways in which banks could cause invested into bonds/equities money to be lost (pooled accounts, for instance).

To update everyone on Rietumu's saga.

We managed to have our account unfreezed and we got all our money (more than 100,000EUR covered by deposit protection) happily transferred to another institution.

I was even able to negotiate some of their frivolous charges off.

I know some posters here were also successful in reclaiming their frozen funds.

Contact your account manager and offer them double-payment for "compliance review". It helps to speed-up some cases.
Or contact your lawyer and threat to sue them for breaking client service terms and illegally charging your accounts.

They are not invincible.

Good luck.

 

[GCK]

I am the victim of Rietumu. I want transfer out all the money but they still keep my money under Due Dilligence.
I don't know how to close my account, they are already still my money under many reason.

I have same issue here! Simple salary account from single source within the EU as a matter of fact! Got a notice about Freeze and this silly DueDiligence which does not seem to end, although form the transactions they can see this is simple salary account in EUR and from within the EU and from a single clean source! Outrageous! Want to transfer the money to private account, even within the same bank, but communication flow is poor ... just a "wait"... fees are skyrocketing and basically no respect! Not sure what will happen but I fear for the worst....

We are looking for all recent victims of Rietumu fraud, specifically where the accounts were:

- suddenly converted from USD to EUR
- frozen for incoming and outgoing transfers
- closed under Clause 15.7 (Prevention of Money Laundering and Terrorist Finance)
- funds seized or frozen without an explanation

Some background:

We are a small international IT consulting firm with clients and employees located in various international locations. We have used an off-shore company for our operation in order to have each employee and shareholder liable for their own taxes in their own jurisdiction - a pretty standard use of offshore companies.

We have had an account with Rietumu since 2013. Running a very clean operation - all wires in and out properly documented and invoiced, no cash operations whatsoever (no cash withdrawals or deposits), maintaining proper books.

On 23 February 2018, we received a notice from a "Jelena Fjodorova", about the termination of legal relations. We were given until 23 April 2018 to transition to another bank.

This notice notwithstanding, we found our account frozen at the end of March, with another letter from "Rietumu Banka" (anonymous) dated 19 March 2018 stating that the Bank is terminating our relationship effective immediately under Clause 15.7 (the Law on the Prevention of Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing.)

The remaining funds (just under 5,000 EUR) were stolen under the guise of a Clause 15.7 "maintenance fee" (which just happens to be 5,000 EUR).

We would like to file a class action lawsuit against Rietumu to recover the stolen funds.

If you were a victim of their fraud, please send me a private message. They think they can break the law with impunity because their victims are offshore companies. Well, not this company. We have not broken any laws or evaded any taxes and we will not stand for it.

Standing by... I think they do deserve a lesson, but not sure how it can be delivered! The "west" became "east"... Latvian government is involved and covers their actions I guess, and as far as ECB goes, they initiate all this economic-fascism and problems... look at Greece, Cyprus, and now Latvia... The whole system will be like that.... Still, if you have any ideas can at least try... My amount is 20 times bigger than yours and in jeopardy for absolutely no reason other than "orders" to terminate certain accounts that they froze...

Absolutely, that's exactly what they are doing. And I have no problem with their de-offshoring policies in general.

The problem is, they are doing it in a fraudulent manner, gratuitously applying Clause 15.7 to customer accounts in order to charge exorbitant account closure fees (5,000 EUR instead of 200 EUR ) and in some cases freeze / steal clients' funds.

Please read the following thread and let me know if you still think it's not worth going after them:

My Experience with Rietumu Bank please read!!!

This "Eastern European" country is a member of the EU. Latvia isn't a banana republic in the Caribbean. They don't get to call our company a money launderer or terrorist, violate their own T&C, steal our money and get away with it.

Bottom line... EU banks especially within the Euro-Zone are far worse than in every other small nation around the globe! You do not hear such outrageous behavior from smaller places outside the EU... Lesson learned no matter the outcome here... stay outside the Euro-Zone... they are worse than a banana republic and their aim is economic collapse.... you can tell by their business policies and actions... only a matter of time!

I am the victim of Rietumu. I want transfer out all the money but they still keep my money under Due Dilligence.
I don't know how to close my account, they are already still my money under many reason.

Welcome to the "club"....

Sounds terrible If you can get together enough people go for it. What are your goals? What are you looking for just the money you lost or further compensation?



Latvia is a banana republic and always has been. Why do you think you were able to open an account there for an offshore company. All EU countries are not created equal. The EU did not give a damn about helping ABLV as it was not considered an important bank to EU. In fact no Latvian bank is considered of systematic importance to EU. Some of their banks have always been well known money laundering entities for Russians and eastern Europeans. It is a well known fact. Remember Baltikums (now BlueOrange) bank that was just a washing machine for Russian money? Remember the old website where it blatantly offered to hide the owner of money and conduct transactions in its own name as a damn service? lol. After issues with money laundering they turned their back on those actions and rebranded to BlueOrange bank. Shame Rietumu did not cleanup their act. Your company is just collateral damage. For a bank willing to launder money stealing your money is nothing to them. Hire a good lawyer and good luck try and settle out of court. You don't want to travel there to plead your case.

baltikums bank | Lawless Latvia

Banks are the biggest criminals and do anything! Finance illegal wars, control politicians.. everything under the sun and especially under the moon! The bigger they are the worst! And they have no honor what so ever! Latvia is a small potato... they act like this following the wishes of their government who in turn follows the wishes of the un-elected EU "officials" who in turn follow the wishes of the private ECB cartel who in turn follows the wishes of the global banking cartel. That simple!

Why did you choose Rietumu bank? Of all countries and banks in the world why a bank in Latvia? Did you not do any research at all before opening an account there? For me its difficult to understand how you did not know the risks of opening a bank account in an Eastern European country..lol. Latvia is one of the poorest EU countries just above Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria.

If I open a bank account in a non-western country I know damn well all the risks and do my homework thoroughly. The information on Latvia as a shady banking sector for Russian money was out there for years. Latvian banks know very well that only shady foreigners put there money there. No foreigner with clean funds, business and nothing to hide chooses Latvia. They also know they can take the money as most clients will not complain as its often illicit gains they have deposited. In your case it may be clean funds and a clean business but who cares.....they certainly don't as they have shown. To them you are foreigner with offshore company and an easy target.

Sorry but you only get what you deserve by not doing due diligence or spending 5 minutes on google before travelling to Latvia to open an account.

You learn from your mistakes. But to try and get back 4800 euros or however much they took, from a banking sector the EU does not give a sh*t about is not the best use of your time. I know it must hurt to lose money but trust me you learnt your lesson and will become wiser in your choices in the future.

Sorry Sir... We are talking about an EU nation inside the Euro-Zone! And I think that is exactly the problem! What are "western banks" like?! Have seen them in Cyprus, Greece, and more to come! Please... Its like saying that in Connecticut banks are lousy and thieves while in New York they are OK! Will not happen! So, this is ONE Euro-Zone... should be serious and uniform! The problem is that ECB strategy creates all these problems... We are heading towards a global economic collapse and the creation of debt, excessive regulations that create economic cardiac arrest and toxic financial instruments are by choice and ECB is one of the master minds by design! Can tell you stories also from the UK or US or Holland where banks do not even allow cash withdraws of 5000 w/o filling up paper work and feel they own your hard earned money! This is simply destruction by design! As for Russia, well do not know of any bank there behaving in such a way! Face it.. inn the EU we have Economic Fascism and this is only the start!

Martin,

Mostly agree. However, there are still ways in which banks could cause invested into bonds/equities money to be lost (pooled accounts, for instance).

To update everyone on Rietumu's saga.

We managed to have our account unfreezed and we got all our money (more than 100,000EUR covered by deposit protection) happily transferred to another institution.

I was even able to negotiate some of their frivolous charges off.

I know some posters here were also successful in reclaiming their frozen funds.

Contact your account manager and offer them double-payment for "compliance review". It helps to speed-up some cases.
Or contact your lawyer and threat to sue them for breaking client service terms and illegally charging your accounts.

They are not invincible.

Good luck.

Hope this will work... Will also try! But a cumulative action like suggested will be probably more effective! Ready when the team decides so...

They are delaying giving you back your money on purpose as they will need your money it for a bail-in. Secondly it is normal to delay outflows as much as possible to maintain solvency in such a situation. If everybody moves their money to another bank then the bank will be bankrupt overnight like ABLV.

Be happy if you get 100k back via he EU Deposit Guarantee Scheme (DGS)

Advice:

If you are unable to withdraw your money then see if you can ask your RM if you can invest the excess over 100k QUICKLY into stocks or bonds that are not issued by the bank. At lSecurities/Custody account cannot be touched by any bail-in or bankruptcy of the bank ;-) Those assets in a portfolio become segregated from the banks assets and do not form part of any bail-in or bankruptcy. Hence why the rich dump their cash into short term government treasuries even if it has a negative yield. Loosing 0.5% per a year on a negative yielding government bond is better than loosing 100% (-100k EU insured amount) to a bank collapse.

To anyone else.....NEVER keep large amounts of cash in excess of 100k in any EU bank. Always buy short term safe government bonds with excess (i.e Germany, Netherlands) even if bond is negative yielding. That way you are covered in case of any bank collapse

Maybe! As alternative could invest in real-estate property OUTSIDE the EuroZone and the "old west" areas in general, and/or crypto currencies, gold and silver! Bonds will ALSO collapse when the masters decide so! As for Holland... Well... 9 years experience there! It is NOT the place it used to be... Economic banking and property fascism is there big time.... Germany was better but now also getting worse by the month! UK maybe OK, and especially Scotland, since it's a root in the west still, many global interests there and NOT part of the Eur-Zone...

Martin,

Mostly agree. However, there are still ways in which banks could cause invested into bonds/equities money to be lost (pooled accounts, for instance).

To update everyone on Rietumu's saga.

We managed to have our account unfreezed and we got all our money (more than 100,000EUR covered by deposit protection) happily transferred to another institution.

I was even able to negotiate some of their frivolous charges off.

I know some posters here were also successful in reclaiming their frozen funds.

Contact your account manager and offer them double-payment for "compliance review". It helps to speed-up some cases.
Or contact your lawyer and threat to sue them for breaking client service terms and illegally charging your accounts.

They are not invincible.

Good luck.

How did you manage to unfreeze your funds exactly? And how long you had them frozen? Was it by lawyer or by making deal with account manager offering higher review fees? What do you advise? And if by lawyer can you recommend one?
My case is based on simple salary account from very clean EU source... nothing more!
Any hint will be greatly appreciated. Many thanks in advance!

 

[Martin Everson]

Sorry Sir... We are talking about an EU nation inside the Euro-Zone! And I think that is exactly the problem! What are "western banks" like?! Have seen them in Cyprus, Greece, and more to come! Please... Its like saying that in Connecticut banks are lousy and thieves while in New York they are OK! Will not happen! So, this is ONE Euro-Zone... should be serious and uniform! The problem is that ECB strategy creates all these problems... We are heading towards a global economic collapse and the creation of debt, excessive regulations that create economic cardiac arrest and toxic financial instruments are by choice and ECB is one of the master minds by design! Can tell you stories also from the UK or US or Holland where banks do not even allow cash withdraws of 5000 w/o filling up paper work and feel they own your hard earned money! This is simply destruction by design! As for Russia, well do not know of any bank there behaving in such a way! Face it.. inn the EU we have Economic Fascism and this is only the start!

Eastern Europe is EU by name only. Their membership means nothing to the EU...lol. No one in western Europe gives a damn about a Baltic state other than when it comes to ensuring they support the EU's anti Russia agenda. Eastern Europe, Cyprus and Greece will just be used as an excuse to push for further EU economic integration. It is all part of a bigger picture. You can translate that as meaning bring a country to its knees, force privatization for the benefit or rich politically connected friends who can bow scavenge once profitable businesses for cents on the euro. Like I said don't keep more than 100k in any EU bank, government bonds are way to go until you can find hard assets to buy. Anyway this is all way off topic.

 

[Martin Everson]

Contact your account manager and offer them double-payment for "compliance review". It helps to speed-up some cases.

That is a true example of a banana republic......."Hey senora, you give 2000 euro and I speak people make very fast problem go away"

 

[W4rhol]

Eastern Europe is EU by name only. Their membership means nothing to the EU...lol. No one in western Europe gives a damn about a Baltic state other than when it comes to ensuring they support the EU's anti Russia agenda. Eastern Europe, Cyprus and Greece will just be used as an excuse to push for further EU economic integration. It is all part of a bigger picture. You can translate that as meaning bring a country to its knees, force privatization for the benefit or rich politically connected friends who can bow scavenge once profitable businesses for cents on the euro. Like I said don't keep more than 100k in any EU bank, government bonds are way to go until you can find hard assets to buy. Anyway this is all way off topic.

Even if you buy physical gold, the state can take it from you for free. It's already happen in France and in the USA in the last century.

If you buy a house or a flat for rent it and you think that it will keep your capital safe, then you make a mistake. Most of all the EU state have big debt. Which means that they will increase the taxes on good who are difficult to move outside of their jurisdiction and who have a lower coefficient of celerity (you cannot sell a house in 15 days and move the money from that sell overseas in 5 minutes with a wire transfert).

The best advice is to move everything you have outside europe and that's all. Some place in Asia are very safe but it's have a price...

 

[Martin Everson]

Even if you buy physical gold, the state can take it from you for free. It's already happen in France and in the USA in the last century.

If you buy a house or a flat for rent it and you think that it will keep your capital safe, then you make a mistake.

I never mentioned buying gold or property but you did..lol. Think outside the box ;-)

Most of all the EU state have big debt. Which means that they will increase the taxes on good who are difficult to move outside of their jurisdiction and who have a lower coefficient of celerity (you cannot sell a house in 15 days and move the money from that sell overseas in 5 minutes with a wire transfert).

You need to understand how the system works. There is no intention of governments to ever pay of national debts. Why pay of debts when you can simply change the rules of the game when the time comes....(wink to US) ;-)

Again not sure why you fixate on property. For most people property is a liability and not an asset and that is where people go wrong unfortunately :-(

The best advice is to move everything you have outside europe and that's all. Some place in Asia are very safe but it's have a price...

Bad advice if ever I heard it. The geographical location of assets is not the determining factor in safety of assets. The best advice is to structure yourself correctly by relocating before moving stuff outside EU. However most people do not want to do this and that is bad news.

 

[ak2000]

How did you manage to unfreeze your funds exactly? And how long you had them frozen? Was it by lawyer or by making deal with account manager offering higher review fees? What do you advise? And if by lawyer can you recommend one?
My case is based on simple salary account from very clean EU source... nothing more!
Any hint will be greatly appreciated. Many thanks in advance!

I did it through a "interesting" local law firm in a matter of hours. Blew me away

Message me if you need details (email posted on this thread with Admin's kind permission)

Someone else did it without (different company structure)

Have spoken with the bank extensively "off the record", they are not invincible with the right approach

Can provide limited info here, happy to share what I learned from this incredible "adventure" so others can get out of this too hopefully

Good luck

 

[GCK]

I did it through a "interesting" local law firm in a matter of hours. Blew me away

Message me if you need details (email posted on this thread with Admin's kind permission)

Someone else did it without (different company structure)

Have spoken with the bank extensively "off the record", they are not invincible with the right approach

Can provide limited info here, happy to share what I learned from this incredible "adventure" so others can get out of this too hopefully

Good luck

Hello dear ak2000. Many thanks for replying to my request.
Please send me if you can the information about this law-firm who helped you or any other way possible.
I have NO NEWS from this terrible bank still, despite my efforts... They do not even say when my queue will be processed! Just "wait" is all I get! My email is [email protected] . Appreciate any help or hint.
Also my thanks to the administration who helps co-ordinate this discussion.
Very Kind Regards!

 

[ak2000]

Happy to help any way I can, am getting inundated with requests

Please use the details shared earlier in the thread

Thank you for your understanding and hope as many of us can make it out of this sh***y situation

 

[Martin Everson]

Rietumu assets down 28% in first quarter as bank reforms bite

Rietumu assets down 28% in first quarter as bank reforms bite

The 124-page report reveals "Total assets of the Bank fell by 28% in the first quarter 2018. Funds at current accounts and deposits due to customers decreased to EUR 1.5 billion at the end of 1st quarter 2018 comparing to EUR 2.4 billion as at 31 December 2017."

Nevertheless, the bank said, it retains high liquidity.

The effect of legislation to outlaw doing business with offshore shell companies is also evident in the report, which says: "On 19 March 2018, the Bank decided to reclassify more than 4,000 of its corporate customers from “High Risk” category to “Prohibited Risk” category. Prohibited Risk means that the Bank is to terminate its relationship with these customers within a period of two months. In addition, customers classified as “Prohibited Risk” are not allowed to execute transactions. Account closure of a “Prohibited Risk” account is subject to increased compliance restrictions. These customers represent about two-thirds of all non-Latvian corporate customers of the Bank. The majority of these customers are domiciled outside the EU and OECD in so-called off-shore jurisdictions."

In addition, Rietumu said it was planning a major overhaul of its business strategy in the wake of the new legislation, but that it was difficult to do so without precise guidance from the financial regulator on exactly what the new rules are. The new strategy will be ready by June 2018, the bank said.

"'...due to the fact that the details of the changes in Latvian legislation are not yet published and adopted into law, there is a material uncertainty related to the above events and conditions that may cast significant doubt on the Bank’s and the Group’s ability to continue as a going concern. As a result, the Bank and the Group may be unable to realize its assets or discharge its liabilities in the normal course of business," Rietumu warned, while adding that various stress tests it had performed on itself showed the bank’s and group’s liquidity and capital adequacy levels remaining above required thresholds.

"The Board of Directors admits that material uncertainty exists in relation to the future outcomes of these events that may cast significant doubt on the Bank’s and the Group’s ability to continue as a going concern," the statement reiterates.

As recently reported by LSM, Rietumu also shook up its managing board in recent weeks, ousting the chairman and cutting the number of members serving.

 

[kst2001]

Rietumu got my account frozen too. Same story as I've read from you guys. They accused me being a "shell company"

I submitted all documents they requested the next day after they got the account frozen...and they are taking their time to reply ... it's been 35 days or so since they suspended my account...really hard to communicate with them

They charged me 3000EUR in ridiculous account maintenance fees so far after they suspended my account.

Please help!
Thank you

 

[Martin Everson]

http://www.rietumu.lv/documents/english/ar/ar2017.pdf

"In the beginning of year 2018 Latvian banking sector faced local and international reputational crisis which also affect the Bank and the Group. On 13 February 2018, the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (‘FinCEN’) issued a finding and notice of proposed rulemaking (‘NPRM’), pursuant to Section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act, against one of Latvia’s largest banks. Shortly afterwards, a high government official was detained by Latvia’s anti-corruption authorities (‘KNAB’) in a bribery-linked allegation case. Partly in response to these events there have also been some significant actions within the Bank in 2018. The Bank has made immediate changes to its operations. In 2018, the Bank decided to re - translate all customer USD balances to EUR and the Bank decided to terminate its relationship with a significant number of high risk customers."

The above is taken from Rietumu 2017 annual report. They are doing a major de-risking exercise and getting out of the dollar...LIKE EVERYONE SHOULD!!!! Your lucky they have not yet done a bail-in. If the pattern of 28% of assets lost in first quarter of 2018 is repeated throughout the year then your money is going to become shares in Rietumu - a bail-in is coming.

Anyway, they will have to work out how to stop the outflows and be profitable...wait, they have solved this already by not answering communications and charging dubious fees ;-)

I have been de-risking myself by abandoning banks that have any US operations, connections or offer USD accounts unless they are too big to fail institutions. Stay safe.

 

[David97255]

@Martin Everson Always smart and funny. I m sitting at my desk and still asking myself : There is nothing to do to keep the money back? Bank decides to block accounts and it's end like this?
PS: No I don't have any account in Rietumu

 

[Dani Cristian]

Same story here..exactly like you describe guys

Rietumu got my account frozen too. They accused me being a "shell company".
Our client that we work with is Google inc (what shell company we are ?!! )

I submitted all documents they requested..and they are taking their time to reply ... after like 40 days they again ask more documents to provide.
They play them gamae to delay and delay...meanwhile they charging my account 1,000 EUR fees and 500 EUR each time they check the document i sent them.

This is not real !! and we have to stop this MAFIA to steal our money ..our business have no relation with Laundering .. we working with Google and all our transaction was clear 100%

Let start initialize a group and start legal action against this bad people.

Thanks

 

[Martin Everson]

meanwhile they charging my account 1,000 EUR fees and 500 EUR each time they check the document i sent them.

Their having a laugh...and this is an EU bank

Well, 28% of their assets lost in first quarter of this year. Read that as 50%+ in reality as the other assets are like yours - blocked from being moved. They are just slowing down the bank run as best they can. They need to keep your assets until end of June quarter, so they can show your assets on their quarterly financial report.

Forget legal action, Latvia is a corrupt banana republic. You got a better chance of going to Russia and winning a liable case against Putin.

 

[Flatworld]

run..people...run~~~

 

[Dani Cristian]

Hello Guys,

Yesterday i spoke with the European Central Bank, They recommend me to contact the FCMC - "Financial and Capital Market Commission" in Latvia
here is the URL:
FKTK - Home page

Also, I made some researches and find "Sanctions imposed by FCMC" :
FKTK - Sanctions imposed by FCMC

Please contact FCMC and write your complain..I think if we get more complains, they will do something against this Mafia bank..

Thanks

 

[kst2001]

Hi Dani,

Can you please instruct on exact steps you took to submit your complaint to FCMC?

Is there like a webpage with a form to submit the complain or how you did it?

Are you from RO, if yes can we can in contact somehow?

Thanks