Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are continuing to discuss this whole issue of banking freezes here in Thailand, it is ridiculous, I'm just angry about it. That said, I have gotten some emails from folks; yeah, I am aware of the legal posture of banking and how deposits - they are not keeping your money, you're becoming a creditor of the bank when you deposit your money into the bank, I get all that, okay. My point is you still remain a creditor; you have a depository account. That is still a piece of property you have a right to. Where do they get the legal authority to come in and mess with your legal rights vis a vis the bank. Also frankly the level of effrontery really of the banks at this point is just ridiculous. I just, we're the customers at the end of the day, and the way that they treat people with regard to this is just awful. 

I go into this, I actually missed, we didn't do our Sunday recording because my producer was not available to help me record and get the video up, but I am making long-form content contemporaneously basically with this video, and it will be going out to our subscribers of our paid news service, Integrity News Service. If you are interested in that, you can email us, [email protected], you can get yourself on the mailing list for that. Also while I am talking my book, it's worth pointing out, my better half and I did set up a restaurant here in downtown Bangkok, Pancake Palace. If you are interested in breakfast anytime or American Diner style food, please feel free to check that out; the link is in the description below, and we would love to see you there. 

Now let's get into this. As we have discussed, they are talking about how they are, "oh we are "temporarily" freezing people's accounts", I'm getting emails from guys that are like "my account has been frozen for days” in some cases weeks. I've gone in, I have tried to give them what they want, it still doesn't get unfrozen; it's not good. That said, quoting directly from a recent article in the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Lawmakers aim to end wrongful bank account freezes. Well my first question is where is the legal authority to do this in the first place? Without just cause, without any kind of probable cause to just say oh, your account is frozen because we think it might be a "mule account". Not apropos of anything. We just think it might be. That said, quoting directly: "Senate committees have proposed measures to combat a wave of wrongful account freezes as part of an effort to eliminate "mule accounts" which have been affecting innocent citizens." And again they use this buzzword terminology. It's sort of like, a lot of this reminds me of COVID. They just roll stuff out; they use buzz words and they say, "oh you have to do this", but they don't really provide any legal basis for why they're doing it. The buzz words don't make any sense. What's a “mule account”? How is that defined? And why are so many people being, how many of these can there possibly be? It's not the easiest thing in the world to set up a bank account, is it? I mean any foreigner who has ever come over here to Thailand and set up a bank account knows that. So first of all, I have a really hard time believing it would be easy for foreigners to come in set up a bunch of mule accounts. Meanwhile even Thais: it's not like you can just walk in and anybody can just press a button and set up a bank account. And what is a "mule account"? Define that. That said, quoting further: "The Senate's Economic, Finance and Banking Committee together with the Legal and Justice Committee, held a press conference on Monday to address rising concerns over the freezing of bank accounts linked to crackdowns of so-called mule accounts.  Senator Palawat Tansiri, spokesperson for the Economic Committee, acknowledged that efforts to combat online fraud and dismantle mule accounts were necessary," - well really, are they necessary? Is this level of intrusive conduct necessary for some scam accounts? Really? Quoting further: "but warned that innocent citizens and small and medium-sized enterprises were being severely affected." Yeah, I mean they are not able to use their own money. This is ridiculous; it's total overreach. Quoting further: Quote: "While freezing accounts quickly may disrupt illegal transfers," - and again, where are you getting the authority to do it? Is there a warrant issued? What is this based on? And again, it is the constant, "oh well that is some scammers out there”, this communal punishment notion. What ever happened to the notion “it is better for 100 guilty men to be acquitted than one innocent man to go to jail”. I mean I think our priorities are way out of whack with this stuff and again, as I have discussed in other videos, I think a lot of this is operating at the behest of foreign undue influence, most notably the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) who has been sticking its nose into Thailand for the last couple of years, and trying to implement all this insane banking and tax regulation, to what end? Is any of this going to turn out good for Thailand or Thais, as we will get to, it doesn't look like it. If anything, at best, it's going to seize up liquidity and cause people go to more cash and meanwhile what benefit is to be gained? Some mule accounts didn't get used? I mean really, where is the benefit to the country for all of this? That said, quoting again: "While freezing accounts quickly may disrupt illegal transfers, in many cases it traps the accounts of innocent people, causing serious disruptions to trade and cash flow." Yeah, it is freezing things up and it is causing people to start to question the system.

And as I have discussed in other videos, I am starting to wonder if this whole thing wasn't sent in by outsiders in order to induce a 1997 like situation which will yet again put Thailand on her back economically and subject to the whims and the mercy of foreign powers. Quoting further: "Mr. Palawat said. He cited lengthy and complicated procedures to unfreeze accounts, inconsistent enforcement standards among officials, and rising uncertainty as obstacles." Yeah, that's the other thing is I'm hearing from all kinds of people, "I've gone in, I've things, I have tried to get my money out. They won't let me, and I'll do everything that they say and then it won't get unlocked in the first place." That's the other thing. Why is the onus on us? You are saying there is a problem here. Due process of law dictates that you need to show us where there is the problem. Not us prove our own innocence in terms of our own money. Quoting further: "In Uthai Thani some small shops have already put up signs refusing bank transfers, with an electronics store owner" - "and electronics store", so this is somebody that is operating in a digital capacity; they are working in the electronics business going against this, - "store owner stating that she has suspended QR payments to avoid being dragged into fraud cases: Quote: "We don't know which customer is genuine or not."

I mean, I thought all this digital banking was supposed to make things better and easier. Has it done any of that? It has made things worse. I thought OECD was to integrate Thailand into the global system, so we make more money, not so it seizes up the liquidity in our system, threatens the confidence of our banking system, and possibly puts us in a position that we were in last time in 1997. 

That said, there is another article on this. Apparently, the Bank of Thailand is now chiming in and again Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, Bank of Thailand aims to quickly unlock frozen accounts. Quote: "The Bank of Thailand is expediting efforts to unlock the financial transactions of suspended accounts affected by investigations into mules." How about you just stop the investigations and figure out a better way to go after mule accounts rather than shutting down and threatening the confidence of the banking system by doing this? How about investigators investigate and stop this, quite honestly totalitarian nonsense, of just, "oh we'll shut things down; shoot first ask questions later; we will figure it out later, and the convenience or frankly the livelihood and the well-being of rank-and-file Thais be damned. Oh mule accounts exist. Therefore we have to do this”. It's like COVID. "Oh a disease exists; therefore your lives have to be upended; we have to shut down the entire economy.” It's nonsense. Quoting further: "in collaboration with relevant agencies, the regulator is upgrading its operational processes to better distinguish between mule accounts and legitimate ones." How about, where is the mandate for this mule account nonsense? Where do they get the legal authority to without just cause, shut down people's bank accounts until they prove that they are not a mule account? Where did this process come from? What law is this based on? Quoting further: "allowing the public to transfer money as usual said Daranee Saeju the Central Bank's Assistant Governor for the Payment System Policy and Financial Protection group." Yeah, great job you're doing. I mean really, I thought the Central Bank's job was to facilitate more liquidity, more convenience in the banking system so commerce can better operate. All of this is happening to the detriment of that. Quoting further: "Under the new system, banks will be able to unlock suspended transactions within one day or as quickly as 3 - 4 hours per case compared with the previous 3 - 7 days. The release would take place once banks verify that the transaction is not linked to mule activity." So it is now on us to prove our transactions are legitimate affirmatively to the banks? And oh thank God, it's going to go down from 3 - 7 days, to 3 - 4 hours. Again, I thought all this digital banking was here to make our lives easier, to facilitate more liquidity, to facilitate more convenience in doing business, not less, not "oh now maybe a transaction is going to result in 3-4 hours spent at the bank to be able to unlock it,” as opposed to 3 - 7 days which is what it currently is. And by the way, I'll get to waiting on this whole miracle here in a moment. Quoting further: "This measure has already been implemented." So they say. I am getting emails from guys that are telling me it's days after they have gone into the bank and they are still not unlocked. Quoting further: "Additionally banks will notify customers in advance about temporary suspensions and the amounts involved. The roll out of this measure is scheduled," - "is scheduled" - "for this month depending on each bank's readiness." What are we talking about here? Why don't we just not do whatever it is we are doing now and do whatever it is we were doing, what? 6 weeks ago? 8 weeks ago? What has changed? Stop acting like this is some obstacle we need to overcome. No, stop looking at all these mule accounts, investigate some other way. Stop shutting down everybody's account apropos of nothing and making them affirmatively prove that they are innocent, which I thought it was "innocent until proven guilty", not "guilty till proven innocent", even in a banking capacity all because “mule accounts”, whatever that is. Again, it reminds me a ton of Covid. Quoting further: "At the peak between August 17th - 23rd this year, around 14,000 accounts were suspended a week. This figure declined to about 10,000 accounts between September 7th and 11th." Well I guess we should all be grateful for that development. Quoting further: "While existing regulations aim to curb mule account activity."

How bad was this, that it warrants this level of reaction, that is causing this level of detrimental effect on the overall economy? Really, mule accounts were that bad? Come on. This is nonsense. Again it reminds me of COVID. "Oh a disease exists, therefore the economy needs to be shut down for 3 years,” even though the disease wasn't as bad as we said it was, even though it really was an exaggeration at best and now everybody tells us how we are in a deficiency in terms of tax revenue after having had our economy shut down for 3 years, and in many cases, businesses just outright died. Now they are telling us, “Oh mule accounts exist. Therefore we have to shut down your bank accounts unless you can prove yourself to be innocent so therefore yeah that's how it's going to be.” I mean come on, this is really, really nonsense. And it's going to have a terrible impact on the economy if we don't watch out. Because people are going to start saying, "hey do I really want to bank there? do I want to do business there? do I want to have to worry about these issues?" Quoting further: "The Central Bank is also monitoring deposit withdrawals" - so now they are monitoring your withdrawals - "but has not detected any irregularities." - Yet. - "The Central Bank remains confident in the liquidity of the banking sector and continues to manage the situation appropriately." Again, says who? 

This stuff is really just creepy. I think it's terrible policy; I think primarily it was brought in at the behest of the last government which we are going to see, the new Prime Minister is going to do the Policy Declaration of the new Government once the Cabinet gets installed so hopefully, we're going to see a U-turn on this. It's nice to see there has at least been some reaction from the Senate. BOT seems to be reacting as well, but again this really isn't difficult, okay. Stop doing what you are doing; stop freezing these accounts apropos of nothing. Figure out another way to investigate “so-called” mule accounts which I just can't believe are such a scourge on Thailand that we need to do all of this and threaten not only the liquidity of the business community of Thailand but also the confidence in the banking sector itself. Hopefully this will turn around sooner rather than later. We will certainly be keeping you updated on this channel as the situation evolves.