Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, I am asking the question, "have the Thai banks just gone mad?" I don't know what's going on here, but it ain't good. So I've received a number of correspondences and I'm going to go through all of this. This will be a rather long video, but I think it's worth it. 

So the first correspondence I got, quoting directly: "Hello Benjamin, I wanted to, anonymously please, share our experiences today trying to open a bank account with (I'm going to leave banking names redacted) at a branch in Hua Hin with my British wife's 800,000 and my 800,000 for annual extensions based on Retirement in (another bank), fixed deposit accounts given all the issues with that bank, we were trying to open up our banking options. Having obtained our Yellow House Book and Pink ID Cards in the last few days, we were keen to try them out." Quoting further: "We never even got to that stage. After queuing for an hour and 10 minutes, the Bank Advisor ignored our yellow House Book and Pink ID cards, didn't even open our passports and asked for our UK ID cards. We explained the UK does not have ID Cards. Next, they asked for UK Driving Licenses. As we have lived in Thailand for so long our UK driving licenses 10 year's validity have expired. Next, they asked for our UK birth certificates. While I can potentially produce mine, my wife has had several name changes since birth. The process of her obtaining the original document's trail and potentially having to" -  excuse me, I think the meant ‘trial’ - "and potentially having to have it all translated and certified is both time-consuming and expensive." - oh, trail of documents, I see what they mean - Quoting further: "As part of the process of obtaining a Yellow House Book, our passports had to be certified by the British Embassy, translated then taken to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. How does presenting an original Birth Certificate add anything further to this already rigorous process? To be treated like this after 8 annual Retirement Extensions, purchasing a condominium, obtaining a Yellow House Book and Pink ID Cards and obtaining Thai Tax Identification numbers and submitting Thai tax returns and paying Thai Tax is bewildering. Thankfully we have other Thai Bank options. Bit by bit the Thai banks are making it nigh on impossible for foreigners to obtain and maintain Thai Bank Accounts. Where is this all going to end? Best wishes." 

So, I might actually do the thumbnail for this from The Truman Show, the button, "How's It going to end?" because I'm starting to ask the question too. Like where does this trail end with regard to this banking stuff, because it's just becoming nightmarish, frankly. And where do they get the gall? These banks, everyone, to be this overreaching into our private lives? I understand that Thai Banks need some documentation in order to open up a bank account. There are certain aspects of "Know Your Customer", which by the way is nonsense when you really think about it over the course of the last century. I find it fascinating that our grandparents, if somebody said, "well we need to know our customer", they would say, "no you don't, I have a right to privacy. I have a right to do transactions; I'm not a criminal. I'm not presumed to be a criminal." That's what a lot of this stems from. The presumption that we are all somehow criminals, because we want to do business. 

Meanwhile, another person forwarded an email to me that said, "Ben, you have discussed the OECD before many times. I thought you might find this interesting.” I'm going to put a link to this in the description below. This is actually an interview with Prime Minister Anutin, Anutin Charnvirakul. It's a Short from YouTube, but it does have English translation, and he gets into, I don't know what thumbnail I'm going to use for this. "How's it to going end" by Truman Show or I might use Tywin Lannister from Game of Thrones" - I haven't decided yet. But that said, in the translation, I'll just quote real quick, and somewhat paraphrase. "Regarding the issue of Thailand needing to prioritize the suppression and corruption and drug trafficking, it is something we must do because we aim to become a member of the OECD." 

One, why do we need to become a member of the OECD? Now I do understand, that this was on Bhumjaithai's, it was planked on there; I talked about it briefly at the time. I was kind of hoping they were just paying lip service to international bankers. Apparently not. Why do we need to be part of this? How is this good for Thailand? Explain to me what the benefits are to Thailand. Now in that clip, Anutin goes on to talk about "hey, we need to worry about being viewed as ethical and things of that nature." I get that, I get that. But what does OECD do with regard to that? It doesn't do anything. All it is overreach, and all we've seen is them shutting down people's bank accounts, interfering in people's private lives and private business transactions, on the premise that we're all presumptively criminals. Without due process, nothing. Where are the warrants for shutting down these so-called mule accounts? Then meanwhile, he goes on it and says "we must be clean." That's why, there is that scene in Game of Thrones where Tywin Lannister is talking to Jaimie Lannister and he says, "why is Ned Stark still alive?" And he says, "it wouldn't have been clean." and Tywin goes "clean." And he just laughs. It's a great scene by the actor Charles Dance; well portrayed. "Clean." I mean, what are we talking about, clean? Why does the rest of the world get to say Thailand isn't clean, and we have to bend and scrape to their expectations of what clean is? Our banking system was working fine before. The last 18 years I've been here, I've liked the Thai banking system; we could move money; we could do business with each other in a more efficient manner than anything I've seen in the last two years that has been brought online. None of this is good for the business sector in Thailand. It's going to slow down velocity of money; it's going to slow down liquidity, neither of which are good things in a prospering economy. What it looks to me like is a bunch of moribund sclerotic institutions from Western Europe that are failing, want to go ahead and try to crack open other economies so they can get a piece of our action for them to survive. It's like vampirism or something. This is nonsense. It's not adding any benefits, it's not adding any value that I can see. 

Meanwhile, I got another email from somebody; I'll keep them anonymous as well. Quoting directly: "Ben, love your stuff and was subscribed before I retired here. We have met down in Pattaya; the trucker from Kentucky if you remember. Anyway keep in mind I am an Elite Visa holder." Quoting further: "I saw a message on my banking app telling me (I'm leaving the bank's names redacted) telling me that maximum daily usages will be changed in April. So here's the new changes without going through their Draconian methods of account verification. 

-       Daily wire amounts: 10,000 Baht. That's 300 bucks. Quoting further:

-       "Daily transfer amount: 10,000 Baht. 

-       Daily withdrawal at teller: 20,000 Baht.

And in fact somebody close to our operation here, and a good friend of mine, was telling me the other day that he was dealing with his own bank and they were saying, they blocked him from removing money from his ATM using his card. What value is any of this adding. This person isn't a criminal. None of these people are criminals. Why are we doing this? Why is the OECD just being deemed as self-evidently be a positive thing for this country? It is clearly not. And you know what? Meanwhile, it's a supranational organization that aims to tell Thailand what to do. Look I've got serious disagreements with a lot of things Trump's done recently, but one thing he got dead right his first day in office was getting the United States the hell out of OECD citing national sovereignty concerns. Mr. Anutin has noted that national sovereignty is important to him and his administration. This pertains to national sovereignty; this is a bunch of offshore bankers telling us how to live our lives at the most microscopic levels. Quoting further: "That is just a few I saw, so I have to pay rent now over two transfers for the full amount over two days. My landlord is cool, but that is totally ridiculous. I thought you may want to look at this and do yet another video on the practices in Thailand's banking."

Yeah, I don't want to do another video actually, but here I am doing it because I am very concerned for the future of Thailand in light of all of these things. This is not going to be good long term. This is the kind of Communism Thailand fought against. This is the kind of overreach by the Government telling us all how we can do business, how much of our own money we can move around. This is ridiculous. 

I am very, very hopeful that Mr. Anutin will see the light on this or perhaps somebody else within this government, and that we need to roll this back. As Mr. Trump himself noted, and I've talked about many times on this channel, OECD is a threat to national sovereignty, for any country around the world. We need to do whatever is in our power to not have this roll out here because I fear we are going to destroy our own economy in the process.