PDIC takes Banco Filipino officials to DOJ for unsafe business practices

Officials of the ill-fated Banco Filipino Savings & Mortgage Corp., which the central bank padlocked on March 17, 2011, were charged before the Department of Justice for supposedly engaging in unsafe and unsound business practices.   The complaint, filed by the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corporation (PDIC), alleged that the officials unduly favored 11 related entities when they approved P3.08 billion in loans–despite adverse findings by bank personnel evaluating the loan applications–in violation of the General Banking Law and the bank’s policy manual.   “This resulted in loss or damage to Banco Filipino. They are related entities because the respondents are also directors or officers of the borrowing companies or the companies that allowed their properties to be used as collaterals for the loans,” PDIC stated in the complaint.   Charged with violating the PDIC charter on conducting business in an unsafe and unsound manner were Banco Filipino chair and president Teodoro Arcenas, Jr., vice chair Albert Aguirre, executive vice president Maxy Abad, and executive vice president Catherine Aguirre-Hernandez.   Also charged were board directors Delfin Dimagiba, Ramon Montano, Orlando Samson, and Francisco Rivera. Refusal to comply with banking laws   They were also charged with 26 counts of willful refusal to comply with banking laws and Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas directives, including the appointment of two independent directors and holding of regular monthly board meetings.   Weeks after Banco Filipino was closed, the Bangko Sentral filed a criminal complaint alleging that Banco Filipino officials falsified and issued false statements to hide the true financial condition of the bank, willfully refused to file audited financial statements, and willfully refused to report DOSRI (directors, officers, stockholders and other related interest) loans.   The officials willfully failed to collect P2.99 billion of these loans although they have been past due for periods ranging from four years to seven years, the PDIC also claimed.   The complaint alleged that the respondents did not exert any effort to collect the loans even as Banco Filipino was already suffering from huge operational losses, adding that the bank spent P515.5 million in legal fees between 2008 and 2011 but not a single centavo was collected from these loans.   Banco Filipino, according to the complaint, advanced P37.556 million as real estate taxes for the collaterals to those loans. “PDIC continues with its pursuit to bring to justice perpetrators of unsafe and unsound banking schemes,” the state-owned deposits insurer. —AE/VS, GMA News