How did Ms. Truong My Lan withdraw more than one million billion VND from SCB?

Ms. Truong My Lan and her accomplices borrowed more than 1,066 trillion VND.

According to the investigation conclusion, from January 1, 2012 to October 7, 2022, SCB Bank lent and disbursed to 1,366 customers, of which Ms. Truong My Lan and her accomplices were responsible for borrowing 2,527 loans with a total amount of more than VND 1,066 trillion. As of October 17, 2022, there were 857 customers borrowing 1,284 loans with an outstanding debt of VND 677,286 billion (including VND 483,971 billion in principal and VND 193,315 billion in interest and fee debt, these loans are in group 5, with no possibility of recovery). The outstanding principal of Ms. Truong My Lan's loans accounted for 93% of the total outstanding principal of 23,042 outstanding loans.

Quick view at 12:00 on November 19: Huge numbers in the Van Thinh Phat case | Haunting road in the suburbs of Ho Chi Minh City

The investigation results of the amount of 483,971 billion VND of outstanding loans of 1,284 loans for 875 customers at SCB showed that after taking over SCB, in order to withdraw money from this bank for personal use, Truong My Lan, through trusted individuals holding key roles at SCB (including Vo Tan Hoang Van, Nguyen Phuong Hong, Truong Khanh Hoang, Tran Thi My Dung...) together with key officials at Van Thinh Phat (Ho Buu Phuong, Nguyen Phuong Anh...) implemented the withdrawal of money from SCB Bank in the form of disbursement for legitimate loan applications (fake loans), even some loans were withdrawn first and the application was completed later. Each amount that needed to be withdrawn in each stage had a different way of doing it and was assigned to Van Thinh Phat's group to set up a "ghost" company, "draw" investment plans for projects, assign departments to calculate appropriate collateral assets...

Thủ đoạn vay và rút ruột tiền SCB của bà Trương Mỹ Lan và đồng phạm - Ảnh 1. — Ms. Truong My Lan accused of "taking over" SCB

In particular, during the disbursement of VND 483,917 billion, the investigation documents show that most of this amount was concentrated in 3 units under the headquarters (Wholesale Customer Business Center, Direct Business Channel for Corporate Customers, HCM Real Estate Lending Hub 2. These 3 units were established mainly to disburse loans for Truong My Lan, avoiding the control of the State Bank of Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh City branch) and 3 large branches (SCB Saigon branch, SCB Cong Quynh branch, SCB Ben Thanh branch) are branches that comply with the orders of Truong My Lan and her accomplices (accounting for 93% of the amount SCB Bank lends, the remaining branches only lend 7% to regular customers). The relevant departments including the Board of Directors, the Board of General Directors, the Business and Investment Council, the Business and Investment Committee, branches and business units only signed legal documents without meeting and to deal with inspections and checks, concealing their criminal activities.

Loan application of Ms. Truong My Lan's group has a separate symbol

The loan and disbursement records of Truong My Lan's group have separate symbols and tracking such as "HSTT" (ie Marketing Headquarters), "Plans, projects" which the subjects look at and understand as lending to Truong My Lan's company. Truong My Lan assigned some people from SCB to coordinate with Van Thinh Phat Group to use the created loan plans to disburse, transfer money to the accounts of individuals and "ghost" legal entities to transfer money out of the SCB Banking system or for individuals and legal entities to withdraw cash to cut off the cash flow.

Truong My Lan directly directed or through subjects such as Nguyen Phuong Hong, Truong Khanh Hoang, Tran Thi My Dung... to direct subjects at SCB Bank, Van Thinh Phat, and asset valuation units to carry out tricks such as creating fake loan customers, renting, asking people to stand in their names for assets; creating fake loan documents; having collateral assets appraised in order to create a set of documents in accordance with regulations to conceal and deal with inspection and examination agencies, in fact to "gut" SCB Bank.

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Van Thinh Phat Group established thousands of legal entities, hired and used thousands of individuals as legal representatives, shareholders, loan applications, and collateral to legally withdraw money from SCB Bank. The reason why the "warehouse" of legal entities and individuals is getting bigger and bigger is because it is necessary to establish many legal entities, "create" many new individuals to take the loan, so when checking credit information on CIC, there will be no large credit balance; and when using old individuals and legal entities, when checking on CIC, it will be seen that they are taking very large loans, not qualified to make a loan application. Of the 875 customers (440 individuals and 435 legal entities), most of them stated that they were only signing documents and files, not receiving or using the money, and did not know that they had such a large debt to SCB. The individuals whose names are on collateral all stated that they were only in their household names, not their assets.

In addition, to withdraw money from SCB Bank, Truong My Lan and her accomplices used collateral that did not meet legal requirements, inflating the value many times using SCB Bank's loan capital. For example, for 1,284 outstanding loans of Truong My Lan's group, there are 1,166 asset codes with a book value recorded and allocated by SCB Bank of 1,265 trillion VND. Meanwhile, Hoang Quan Valuation Company valued 726/1,166 asset codes with a total allocated book value of 643,029 billion VND, the re-assessed value was 253,692 billion VND... Or 240 collateral assets for 430 loans were swapped with collateral assets (of which many loans were swapped many times, some assets up to 12 times). The value of the mortgaged assets is more than 487,451 billion VND, but when converted into 278 secured assets, the book value is more than 351,948 billion VND. On September 30, 2022, Hoang Quan Valuation Company valued only 260/278 assets, the value was more than 108,109 billion VND.

Old trick of setting up ghost companies, high asset valuation…

Lawyer Truong Thanh Duc, Director of ANVI Law Firm, commented that Ms. Truong My Lan's tricks of setting up "ghost" companies, hiring people to stand in her name on loan applications, or inflating real estate prices as collateral to withdraw money from SCB bank are not new.

Lawyer Truong Thanh Duc emphasized: Legally, current regulations do not prohibit an individual from establishing multiple businesses. Similarly, a business can open subsidiary companies without any restrictions on the number. But in reality, no individual or business opens too many companies because they cannot be managed and do not bring real efficiency unless there is another motive. For example, Ms. Truong My Lan hired nearly a thousand people to establish different companies, intentionally defrauding or circumventing the law, concealing her shady behavior. "The tricks of Ms. Truong My Lan and Van Thinh Phat Group are not new, but to borrow capital from the bank, there must be internal support, support from the supervision of the State Bank, and the police have specifically announced the accomplices and accomplices," Lawyer Duc added.

Sharing the same view, Dr. Nguyen Huu Huan - Ho Chi Minh City University of Economics said that the sophisticated tricks of Truong My Lan's group and accomplices are not new, such as establishing a ghost company, hiring someone to be the name of the mortgaged property, valuing the property high to borrow high... But it is difficult for the authorities to detect, especially when an individual or organization has controlled all the activities of the bank like Ms. Truong My Lan with SCB. To detect fraudulent tricks to withdraw money from the bank through loan contracts like the above, Mr. Nguyen Huu Huan said that the authorities need to apply AI technology to management to detect early abnormalities in banking activities. Instead of currently using only humans to go to and check bank branches, it will be difficult to detect when the file is transferred to another branch for a loan. Or using the ghost company ecosystem, hiring or asking someone to be the name supported by scanning technology will also help the authorities detect more easily.

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