Vietnamese billionaire sentenced to death for $44bn fraud | BBC News

A Vietnamese property developer was sentenced to death on Thursday for looting one of the country's largest banks over a period of 11 years.

Truong My Lan was convicted for taking out $44bn (£35bn) in loans from the Saigon Commercial Bank.

Prosecutors said $27bn may never be recovered.

Authorities said 2,700 people were summoned to testify, while 10 state prosecutors and around 200 lawyers were involved.

The evidence was in 104 boxes weighing a total of six tonnes.

Eighty-five defendants were tried with Truong My Lan, who denied the charges.

#TruongMyLan #Vietnam #BBCNews

[Kroogles]

Meanwhile in the US, all the people responsible for 2008 are out of jail doing the same shit that nearly destroyed the world economy.

[MrBisque]

First billionaire to ever be found accountable for their actions.

[DeEmperor]

In Vietnam, individuals are not allowed to own more than 5% shares in any bank. The woman used shell companies to buy 90% shares in Saigon bank. Then approved 93% of all the bank's loans to her shell companies.

[hanhbuikhl]

Long story short, for those who don't really understand this case : In vietnam, each individual is not allowed to own more than 5% share of a bank. Truong My Lan built up multiple ghost companies, each of the companies she own invested in the bank, own a total of 93% share, making her the anonymous owner of it. She also bribed some politician so that she can easily take all the amount of CASH from the bank whenever she want without being caught. The total amount of money she took from it is worth 44 billions dollar but in cash, it's literally just bank robbery without being noticed by the authorities. That's why she being sentenced to death

[mother_of_doxies]

If she tried to pull this sh!t off in America, she’d be a celebrated politician.

[rpm]

Staggering level of greed. I mean, once you have $1B the next $40 billion isn't going to make much difference to your lifestyle is it?

[LuisinVegas]

Respect to the Vietnamese authorities. Greed is destroying the world.

[Vesperstel]

Fun fact: before her execution, she said that she had hidden the $44 billion in a secret location somewhere in the South China Sea, and challenged people to find it.

[derrviel]

$44bn is already a lot of people from first world countries. For a developing country like Vietnam, $44bn is unimaginable

[jeremynewell]

$44B would give every single Vietnamese worker 3 months of wages.

[xXNxLixeXx]

Defrauding a bank of $44 billion is beyond wild, crazy, and stupid

[fedvvvv]

How greedy can you be?! 44 billion? What a lunatic.

[ANDIBO]

The worrisome part is not that she did this for eleven years, is the amount of people not caught doing similar things who will never face any consequences

[jamesbillington]

Weird. In the US we reward this type of behavior with freedom and no jail time.

[ozzzy]

She did everything she could to keep her two daughters abroad safe. She handled all illegal acts with her niece and did not let her two children be affected. And the two daughters will enjoy that money. A great mother
I'm truly ashamed for her children, driving thousands of people into poverty so they can live happily on stolen money.

[containedhurricane]

Vietnamese authorities didn't play around. Let it be an example for other corrupt individuals

[avarmauk]

$44 Billion!!! Does anyone understand how insane that amount is 😂

[Rayrae]

If it were in my country, they will just talk about it in the news for days even months and yet the person won't be held accountable.

[nhato]

I am Vietnamese and to summarize this world-wide case as follows, it notes that Truong My Lan is a woman of Chinese descent, and she is not the only one in charge of this case but she had an agent behind her to plan and carry out this embezzlement for 11 years.
Basically, she manipulated the bank and countless related parties with the money that people save in the bank, to lend without collateral and without needing to collect debt, like calling out for project investment and then taking the that capital to create more and more projects and then she laundered the money and sent that large amount of money to Switzerland.
She owns a huge of real money that can be easily used directly which are not share and virtual money, so this is called a massive case in the world.
When it doesn't mention about her criminal charge, her mind is extremely out of this world.

[rogerwilson]

If we took this approach in the UK then Parliament would be empty.