Follow The Money: Trump And Deutsche Bank

The connection between Deutsche Bank and corrupt demagogue and con man Donald "Impeached Forever" Trump is at the heart of the secretive and probably criminal relationship that ties the German bank not only to Trump, but to Russian oligarchs and Russian organized crime. The bank knows far more about Trump and his family's finances than just the $2 billion they've loaned him over two decades. David Enrich has a new book on those relationships, "Dark Towers: Deutsche Bank, Donald Trump, and an Epic Trail of Destruction," and has provided a look into those relationships:

"The bank has documents detailing the finances and operations of his businesses. And it has records about internal deliberations over whether and how to do business with Trump — a paper trail that most likely reflects some bank employees’ concerns about potentially suspicious transactions that they detected in the family’s accounts.

One reason all these files could be so illuminating is that the bank’s relationship with Trump extended well beyond making simple loans. ­Deutsche Bank managed tens of millions of dollars of Trump’s personal assets. The bank also furnished him with other services that have not previously been reported: providing sophisticated financial instruments that shielded him from risks and outside scrutiny, and making introductions to wealthy Russians who were interested in investing in Western real estate. If Trump cheated on his taxes, ­Deutsche Bank would probably know. If his net worth is measured in millions, not billions, ­Deutsche Bank would probably know. If he secretly got money from the Kremlin, ­Deutsche Bank would probably know." (our emphasis)

In the past 25 years, Deutsche Bank has earned a reputation as the bank that looks the other way when it comes to laws and regulations, and that it is a favored institution for money launderers and corrupt oligarchs who need a compliant banking partner. It's on the International Monetary Fund's radar, according to the article, as "the most important net contributor to systemic risks" in global banking. Their loan operation was high risk, and they picked some risky characters to loan to:

"Among the first steps was finding recipients for the loans — and that is how Donald Trump became a customer of ­Deutsche Bank. Two decades after striking out on his own in real estate, Trump was then at a low point of his career. He had recently defaulted on his debts to a number of large Wall Street banks — the consequence of many hundreds of millions of dollars of unwise, overleveraged investments in the casino and hotel industries — and was eager to find a financier willing to look past these sins." (our emphasis)

After losing in Federal appeals court to keep his relationship with Deutsche Bank buried, Trump's case has moved to the Supreme Court, which will hear arguments in March. Whether the Republican-majority Supreme Court will rule in favor of Trump or not, the facts will come out. Trump's fierce battles in court are not the actions of an innocent person who has nothing to hide, and what he's hiding must be explosive.