The head of Portugal’s Securities Market Commission admits that she does not know the whereabouts of crucial documents that could prove Banif’s customers were missold financial products and open the way for compensation.
Unless these documents are found, the chances of compensating up to 3,500 people who lost €265 million, remains slim despite Prime Minister, António Costa, stating that this is “a very difficult matter" and that some people clearly "were manifestly deceived."
The president of the Securities Market Commission (CMVM) admitted to Parliament today the missing documents would be crucial to ascertain if there had been fraudulent practices in the marketing of financial products to customers.
CMVM’s president, Gabriela Figueiredo Dias, was in the Committee on Budget and Finance whose members were keen to discuss the sales of financial products by Banif.
Those customers affected, represented by the pressure group ‘Associação de Lesados Banif e Santander Totta’ (ALBOA), claim to have been fraudulent misinformed about financial products in which they invested - mainly bonds.
According to Dias, and rather conveniently for Santander which bought Banif in a clever deal that left the taxpayer with a €3 billion bill, it is no longer known where the documents and digital records might be which makes any investigation “terribly complex” and that “accessing the documentation is decisive, but I do not know how it can be done," said Dias
The CMVM president said that there have been no proven cases of fraudulent practices or false information about the Banif products, but admitted that there may be "new elements" that would change her conclusion - but without the documentary evidence, nothing can be proved.
Banif customers who lost money have taken steps to ensure that the CMVM investigates alleged fraudulent sales, since they then could be considered as common creditors that Santander Totta would be responsible for compensating.
António Costa visited Madeira in March this year and said there was still no solution to solve the problem of the victims of the Banif collapse because the CMVM did not recognise the existence of misselling.
"This is a situation where, unlike what happened at BES, there has not yet been a recognition by the CMVM of undue practices in the sale of products, which greatly limits the State’s ability to find solutions like those we have used for the BES victims," said António Costa.
Until the missing records are uncovered, Banif customers will continue to twist in the wind, their voices unheard.
