Thread: Suspicious Deaths Of Bankers Are Now Classified As "Trade Secrets" - Banksters

Guest Post: Suspicious Deaths Of Bankers Are Now Classified As "Trade Secrets" By Federal Regulator

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 04/28/2014 21:46 -0400

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Submitted by Pam Martens and Russ Martens of Wall Street On Parade,

It doesn’t get any more Orwellian than this: Wall Street mega banks crash the U.S. financial system in 2008. Hundreds of thousands of financial industry workers lose their jobs. Then, beginning late last year, a rash of suspicious deaths start to occur among current and former bank employees. Next we learn that four of the Wall Street mega banks likely hold over $680 billion face amount of life insurance on their workers, payable to the banks, not the families. We ask their Federal regulator for the details of this life insurance under a Freedom of Information Act request and we’re told the information constitutes “trade secrets.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the life expectancy of a 25 year old male with a Bachelor’s degree or higher as of 2006 was 81 years of age. But in the past five months, five highly educated JPMorgan male employees in their 30s and one former employee aged 28, have died under suspicious circumstances, including three of whom allegedly leaped off buildings – a statistical rarity even during the height of the financial crisis in 2008.

There is one other major obstacle to brushing away these deaths as random occurrences – they are not happening at JPMorgan’s closest peer bank – Citigroup. Both JPMorgan and Citigroup are global financial institutions with both commercial banking and investment banking operations. Their employee counts are similar – 260,000 employees for JPMorgan versus 251,000 for Citigroup.

Both JPMorgan and Citigroup also own massive amounts of bank-owned life insurance (BOLI), a controversial practice that pays the corporation when a current or former employee dies. (In the case of former employees, the banks conduct regular “death sweeps” of public records using former employees’ Social Security numbers to learn if a former employee has died and then submits a request for payment of the death benefit to the insurance company.)

Wall Street On Parade carefully researched public death announcements over the past 12 months which named the decedent as a current or former employee of Citigroup or its commercial banking unit, Citibank. We found no data suggesting Citigroup was experiencing the same rash of deaths of young men in their 30s as JPMorgan Chase. Nor did we discover any press reports of leaps from buildings among Citigroup’s workers.

Given the above set of facts, on March 21 of this year, we wrote to the regulator of national banks, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), seeking the following information under the Freedom of Information Act (See OCC Response to Wall Street On Parade’s Request for Banker Death Information):

The number of deaths from 2008 through March 21, 2014 on which JPMorgan Chase collected death benefits; the total face amount of BOLI life insurance in force at JPMorgan; the total number of former and current employees of JPMorgan Chase who are insured under these policies; any peer studies showing the same data comparing JPMorgan Chase with Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Citigroup.

The OCC responded politely by letter dated April 18, after first calling a few days earlier to inform us that we would be getting nothing under the sunshine law request. (On Wall Street, sunshine routinely means dark curtain.) The OCC letter advised that documents relevant to our request were being withheld on the basis that they are “privileged or contains trade secrets, or commercial or financial information, furnished in confidence, that relates to the business, personal, or financial affairs of any person,” or relate to “a record contained in or related to an examination.”

The ironic reality is that the documents do not pertain to the personal financial affairs of individuals who have a privacy right. Individuals are not going to receive the proceeds of this life insurance for the most part. In many cases, they do not even know that multi-million dollar policies that pay upon their death have been taken out by their employer or former employer. Equally important, JPMorgan is a publicly traded company whose shareholders have a right under securities laws to understand the quality of its earnings – are those earnings coming from traditional banking and investment banking operations or is this ghoulish practice of profiting from the death of workers now a major contributor to profits on Wall Street?

As it turns out, one aspect of the information cavalierly denied to us by the OCC is publicly available to those willing to hunt for it. On March 24 of this year, we reported that JPMorgan Chase held $10.4 billion in BOLI assets at its insured depository bank as of December 31, 2013.

We reached out to BOLI expert, Michael D. Myers, to understand what JPMorgan’s $10.4 billion in BOLI assets at its commercial bank might represent in terms of face amount of life insurance on its workers. Myers said: “Without knowing the length of the investment or its rate of return, it is difficult to estimate the face amount of the insurance coverage. However, a cash value of $10.4 billion could easily translate into more than $100 billion in actual insurance coverage and possibly two or three times that amount” said Myers, a partner in the Houston, Texas law firm McClanahan Myers Espey, L.L.P.

Myers’ and his firm have represented the families of deceased employees for almost two decades in cases involving corporate-owned life insurance against employers such as Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., Fina Oil and Chemical Co., and American Greetings Corp. (Families may be entitled to the proceeds of these policies if employee consent was required under State law and was never given and/or if the corporation cannot show it had an “insurable interest” in the employee — a tough test to meet if it’s a non key employee or if the employee has left the firm.)

As it turns out, the $10.4 billion significantly understates the amount of money JPMorgan has tied up in seeking to profit from workers’ deaths. Since Wall Street banks are structured as holding companies, we decided to see what type of financial information might be available at the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC), a federal interagency that promotes uniform reporting standards among banking regulators.

The FFIEC’s web site provided access to the consolidated financial statements of the bank holding companies of not just JPMorgan Chase but all of the largest Wall Street banks. We conducted our own peer review study with the information that was available.

Four of Wall Street’s largest banks hold a total of $68.1 billion in BOLI assets. Using Michael Myers’ approximate 10 to 1 ratio, that would mean that over time, just these four banks could potentially collect upwards of $681 billion in tax free income from life insurance proceeds on their current and former workers. (Death benefits are received tax free as is the buildup in cash value in the policies.) The breakdown in BOLI assets is as follows as of December 31, 2013:

Bank of America $22.7 billion
Wells Fargo 18.7 billion
JPMorgan Chase 17.9 billion
Citigroup 8.8 billion

In addition to specifics on the BOLI assets, the consolidated financial statements also showed what each bank was reporting as “Earnings on/increase in value of cash surrender value of life insurance” as of December 31, 2013.

Those amounts are as follows:
Bank of America $625 million
Wells Fargo 566 million
JPMorgan Chase 686 million
Citigroup 0

Given the size of these numbers, there is another aspect to BOLI that should raise alarm bells among both regulators and shareholders. The Wall Street banks are using a process called “separate accounts” for large amounts of their BOLI assets with reports of some funds never actually leaving the bank and/or being invested in hedge funds, suggesting lessons from the past have not been learned.
On May 20, 2008, Bloomberg News reported that Wachovia Corp. (now owned by Wells Fargo) and Fifth Third Bancorp reported major losses on failed gambles with BOLI assets.

“Wachovia reported a $315 million first-quarter loss in its bank-owned life insurance program, known as BOLI, because of investments in hedge funds managed by Citigroup Inc. Fifth Third said in a lawsuit filed last month that it had losses of $323 million from Citigroup’s Falcon funds, which slumped more than 50 percent in the past year as the subprime market collapsed.” Citigroup’s Falcon Strategies hedge fund had lost as much as 75 percent of its value by May 2008.

Following are the names and circumstances of the five young men in their 30s employed by JPMorgan who experienced sudden deaths since December along with the one former employee.

Joseph M. Ambrosio, age 34, of Sayreville, New Jersey, passed away on December 7, 2013 at Raritan Bay Medical Center, Perth Amboy, New Jersey. He was employed as a Financial Analyst for J.P. Morgan Chase in Menlo Park. On March 18, 2014, Wall Street On Parade learned from an immediate member of the family that Joseph M. Ambrosio died suddenly from Acute Respiratory Syndrome.

Jason Alan Salais, 34 years old, died December 15, 2013 outside a Walgreens in Pearland, Texas. A family member confirmed that the cause of death was a heart attack. According to the LinkedIn profile for Salais, he was engaged in Client Technology Service “L3 Operate Support” and previously “FXO Operate L2 Support” at JPMorgan. Prior to joining JPMorgan in 2008, Salais had worked as a Client Software Technician at SunGard and a UNIX Systems Analyst at Logix Communications.

Gabriel Magee,39,died on the evening of January 27, 2014 or the morning of January 28, 2014. Magee was discovered at approximately 8:02 a.m. lying on a 9^th level rooftop at the Canary Wharf European headquarters of JPMorgan Chase at 25 Bank Street, London. Hisspecific area of specialty at JPMorgan was “Technical architecture oversight for planning, development, and operation of systems for fixed income securities and interest rate derivatives.” A coroner’s inquest to determine the cause of death is scheduled for May 20, 2014 in London.

Ryan Crane,age 37, died February 3, 2014,at his home in Stamford, Connecticut. The Chief Medical Examiner’s office is still in the process of determining a cause of death. Crane was an Executive Director involved in trading at JPMorgan’s New York office. Crane’s death on February 3 was not reported by any major media until February 13, ten days later, when Bloomberg News ran a brief story.

Dennis Li (Junjie),33 years old,died February 18, 2014as a result of a purported fall from the 30-story Chater House office building in Hong Kong where JPMorgan occupied the upper floors. Li is reported to have been an accounting major who worked in the finance department of the bank.

Kenneth Bellando, age 28, was found outside his East Side Manhattan apartment building on March 12, 2014. The building from which Bellando allegedly jumped was only six stories – by no means ensuring that death would result. The young Bellando had previously worked for JPMorgan Chase as an analyst and was the brother of JPMorgan employee John Bellando, who was referenced in the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations’ report on how JPMorgan had hid losses and lied to regulators in the London Whale derivatives trading debacle that resulted in losses of at least $6.2 billion.

Related Articles:
Swiss Insurers and JPMorgan Have More than ‘Suicides’ in Common
A Rash of Deaths and a Missing Reporter — With Ties to Wall Street Investigations
Suspicious Death of JPMorgan Vice President, Gabriel Magee, Under Investigation in London
JPMorgan Vice President’s Death in London Shines a Light on the Bank’s Close Ties to the CIA
As Bank Deaths Continue to Shock, Documents Reveal JPMorgan Has Been Patenting Death Derivatives

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-0...federal-regula

Two More Bankers Die in Strange Circumstances

Nicholas Valtz, 39, died on July 20th following an apparent kiteboarding accident. His body was found floating near Lazy Point in Napeague Harbor, Long Island.

Valtz had worked for Goldman Sachs since 2000. He was promoted to managing director in 2010. His wife, Sashi, also works for Goldman Sachs.
Earlier in July, JP Morgan executive director Julian Knott shot his wife Alita to death with a shotgun before turning the gun on himself.
With these two most recent deaths, the current death toll for high-level banking professionals in some of the world’s largest banks has reached 20 in the year 2014 alone. Due to the high number of suspicious deaths of relatively young people, many suspect foul play is involved.
Click here to see a detailed list of the other 18 that have died so far in 2014. We first published this list on March 21, 2014 and have been adding names to it ever since.

http://survivaljoe.net/blog/banker-d...paign=140815SJ




20 Financial Professionals Dead or Missing Since January 1st – Why?

At least 20 people in the financial industry have gone missing or died since the beginning of the year. Many of these deaths have been classified as suicides.

But if you look at these deaths and disappearances, something doesn’t quite seem right. How do so many high-level bankers and financial professionals disappear, commit suicide, or die in freak accidents in such a short period of time?
It goes beyond coincidence.
What’s more, the circumstances of nearly every case seem to point to foul play — not suicide. For example, have you ever heard of somebody committing suicide by seven self-inflicted wounds to the head and stomach… with a nail gun?
Yeah, me neither.
A total of 20 people in the financial sector have disappeared or died since the beginning of 2014. At least six of these have “jumped” (or been helped to their deaths) from tall buildings or structures.
Here is a list of names and dates of those who’ve disappeared or are known to be deceased. (This list has been aggregated from multiple sources.)
#1 – January 11, 2014

MISSING: David Bird, 55, a long-time reporter for the Wall Street Journal working at the Dow Jones news room, went for a walk on Saturday, January 11, 2014 near his New Jersey home and disappeared without a trace. Bird was a reporter of the oil and commodity markets, which happened to be under investigation by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations for price manipulation.

At least one family member suspects Bird’s disappearance was related to his ongoing coverage of OPEC. When Bird left his home, he was not carrying water, his cell phone, or any of his daily medication. Bird had a liver transplant ten years ago and requires anti-rejection medication twice a day. He leaves a wife and two teenage children behind.
#2 – January 26, 2014

DECEASED: Tim Dickenson, a U.K.-based communications director at Swiss Re AG, was reportedly found dead under undisclosed circumstances. The cause of death has still not been released.

#3 – January 26, 2014

DECEASED: William Broeksmit, 58, former senior manager for Deutsche Bank, was found hanging in his home from an apparent suicide. It is important to note that Deutsche Bank is under investigation for reportedly hiding $12 billion in losses during the financial crisis and for potentially rigging the foreign exchange markets. The allegations are similar to the claims the institution settled in 2013 over involvement in rigging the Libor interest rates.

#4 – January 27, 2014

DECEASED: Karl Slym, 51, managing director of Tata Motors was found dead on the fourth floor of the Shangri-La hotel in Bangkok. He was attending a board meeting in the Thai capital. Authorities say he “jumped” to his death from the 22nd floor while his wife was sleeping. Police say it would have been impossible to “accidentally fall” from the window, which means Slym either committed suicide or was murdered.

#5 – January 28, 2014

DECEASED: Gabriel Magee, 39, a Vice President at JPMorgan in London, plunged to his death from the roof of the 33-story European headquarters of JPMorgan in Canary Wharf. Magee was involved in “Technical architecture oversight for planning, development, and operation of systems for fixed income securities and interest rate derivatives” based on his online Linkedin profile.

#6 – January 29, 2014

DECEASED: Mike Dueker, 50, who had worked for Russell Investment for five years, was found dead close to the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in Washington State. Dueker was reported missing on January 29, 2014. He supposedly died from a 50-foot fall from a highway ramp down an embankment. Police stated that he “could have” jumped over the fence, and are therefore treating the case as a suicide.

#7 – February 3, 2014

DECEASED: Ryan Henry Crane, 37, was found dead inside his Stamford, Connecticut home. He was the Executive Director in JPMorgan’s Global Equities Group. Of particular relevance is that Crane oversaw all of the trade platforms and had close working ties with the now deceased Gabriel Magee of JPMorgan’s London desk. The ties between Mr. Crane and Mr. Magee are undeniable and outright troublesome. The cause of death has not yet been determined, pending the results of a toxicology report.

#8 – February 6, 2014

DECEASED: Richard Talley, 57, was the founder and CEO of American Title, a company he founded in 2001. Talley and his company were under investigation by state insurance regulators at the time of his death. He was found in the garage of his Colorado home by a family member who called authorities. Talley reportedly died from seven or eight “self-inflicted” wounds from a nail gun fired into his torso and head.

#9 – February 18, 2014

DECEASED: 33-year-old JPMorgan finance pro, Li Junjie, leaped to his death from the roof of the bank’s 30-story Hong Kong office, according to a bank spokesperson. Police allegedly tried to talk him out of jumping prior to his death. Junjie did not leave a suicide note.

#10 – February 19, 2014

DECEASED: James Stuart, former CEO of National Bank of Commerce whose career path includes time at Citibank and First Commerce Bancshares, was found dead in Scottsdale, Arizona on the morning of February 19. The cause of death has not been announced.

#11 – February 28, 2014

DECEASED: Autumn Radtke, a 28-year-old American CEO of digital currency exchange firm First Meta, was found dead in her Singapore apartment on Feb. 28. Local media called it a suicide, but some are still skeptical.

#12 – March 11, 2014

DECEASED: Edmund (Eddie) Reilly, 47, a divorced father-of-three who worked as a trader at Vertical Group in Manhattan. He jumped (or was pushed) in front of a Long Island Rail Road train on March 11. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

#13 – March 12, 2014

DECEASED: 28-year-old investment banker Kenneth Bellando, who worked for Levy Capital, was found on the ground outside his Eastside apartment complex. Authorities reported that he jumped from a sixth-story roof to the pavement below. Bellando is a former investment bank analyst with JP Morgan and the son of John Bellando, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer at Conde Nast. His brother John is a chief investment officer with JPMorgan who works on risk exposure valuations.

#14 – April 5, 2014

DECEASED: Jan Peter Schmittmann, 57, was found dead along with the body of his wife and his 22-year-old daughter. It appeared to be a murder/suicide scene. Schmittmann ran the domestic operations of Dutch bank ABN Amro between 2003 and 2007. He was widely criticized for landing an 8 million euro ($10.95 million) pay-off after the bank’s collapse and subsequent nationalization.

#15 – April 7, 2014

DECEASED: Jürgen Frick, 48, was shot dead in the underground garage of his bank located in the city of Balzers, Liechtenstein. He was the CEO of Bank Frick & Co. AG.

#16 – April 18, 2014

DECEASED: Benedict Philippens, 37, was found dead in an execution-style murder scene inside his home. He was a bank manager at BNP Paribas Fortis in Belgium. He was murdered along with his wife and 9-year-old son.

#17 – April 22, 2014

DECEASED: Lydia _____, 52, jumped to her suicide from the 14th floor of Bred-Banque Populaire in Paris after questioning her superiors. Lydia was the first female banker to commit suicide in 2014.

#18 – April 23, 2014

DECEASED: Li Jianhua, 49, died of a sudden heart attack and was found dead in his home by his wife. Jianhua was the director of China’s Banking Regulatory Commission. He was concerned about growing risk in the financial sector, and had introduced measures to “fundamentally restructure” the industry.

#19 – July 5, 2014

DECEASED: JP Morgan executive director Julian Knott shot his wife Alita to death with a shotgun before turning the gun on himself. The 45-year-old, who worked for the investment bank in London until July 2010, shot his 47-year-old wife multiple times before committing suicide with the same weapon. Knott moved to the United States from London in 2010 and was working at JP Morgan’s Global Network Operations Center in Whippany, New Jersey, at the time of the tragedy.

#20 – July 20, 2014

DECEASED: Nicholas Valtz, 39, died following an apparent kiteboarding accident. His body was found floating near Lazy Point in Napeague Harbor, Long Island. Valtz had worked for Goldman Sachs since 2000. He was promoted to managing director in 2010. His wife, Sashi, also works for Goldman Sachs.

Why So Many Suicides in Such a Short Period of Time?

Some people see nothing mysterious about the recent spate of suicides. They believe it is rather obvious why bankers are killing themselves: self-loathing.

For example, “The Resident” (who reports for RT America) says, “The current path of these bankers — greed, high-stakes gambling, and the knowledge that they were screwing their neighbors — would ultimately be too hard to live with for any human.”




While The Resident’s theory isn’t necessarily a bad one, it is apparent to me that many (if not all) of these suicides, deaths, and disappearances are part of something bigger going down inside the financial industry. In fact, Steven Quayle’s inside banking source who goes by “V” reported the following on February 5th:

V’S ALERT MORE ASSASSINATIONS OF WALL STREET BANKERS GOING DOWN-HIT TEAMS FULLY OPERATIONAL ON WALL STREET

Big big things are going down..look at Japan look at the hits another “suicide” just like I said. Ill be back in the office on the 10th. We are going into the hurricane my brother and there are very few life boats. Talked to my N.Y. FEDeral expresso source no yellow metal anywhere in central banks and bullion banks. China is grabbing all along with the rest of S.E. Asia.

Word on the “street” watch for a top level American bankster to expire. Hit teams are fully operational in Wall Street. (REDACTED) HIGHLY VISIBLE POWER BROKER- co-ordinating. Speak to you soon. Please post this to warn sheep. V-UPDATE 9:24 AM MOUNTAIN-NEXT ON THE HIT LIST CITI EXECUTIVE TIED IN WITH FOREX FRAUD -HIT LIST HAS 3 DOZEN MORE NAMES-DESPERATE TIMES REQUIRE DESPERATE MEASURES IN THE WORLD OF MONETARY CONTROL! JPM can’t hold yellow metal shorts on notional gold. LIBOR and derivative hits continue as bankster suddenly commit “suicide”. 43 are on the knock off list and counting. The shock waves of this and many other scandals are creating turmoil everywhere.
I was the first to report to you the heads of banking are operating from remote secondary locations. Spring cleaning has come early as the house is being swept clean. There is no honor amoung thieves. This is the final year to have your finances and wealth in order. Be prepared.
V

V’s warning was published on Quayle’s site after the first seven deaths had already been reported. There have been six 13 deaths since. If there are 43 on the hit list, as he claims, then there could be another 30 23 deaths (or “suicides”) in the near future.

One thing is for sure… all of us need to be on high alert. Something stinks in the land of high finance, and it can’t remain a secret forever.
Don’t be scared. Be prepared.
-Survival Joe

P.S. Real gold and silver are some of the best protections against fiat currency and a corrupt banking system. Consider getting some while prices are still low.

Additional Sources for this Article:
http://nypost.com/2014/03/05/bitcoin...ected-suicide/
http://nypost.com/2014/03/17/investm...-to-his-death/
http://nypost.com/2014/02/18/jpmorga...h-for-company/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...cide-year.html
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-0...ommits-suicide
http://americablog.com/2014/02/three...tigations.html
http://www.christianpost.com/news/al...lation-115425/
http://www.silverdoctors.com/jim-wil...istle-blowing/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...el-window.html
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101557865
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/chinas-refo...attack-1445982
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-0...frick-murdered
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-0...rdered-belgium
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ng-outing.html

http://survivaljoe.net/blog/why-have...ied-this-year/