Justice Department Rolls Out An Early Form Of Capital Controls In America

Zero Hedge ^ | 03/20/2015 | Tyler Durden

[Cheerio]

Something stunning took place earlier this week, and it quietly snuck by, unnoticed by anyone as the "all important" FOMC meeting was looming. That something could have been taken straight out of the playbook of either Cyprus, or Greece, or the USSR "evil empire", or all three.

This is how the WSJ explained it:
The U.S. Justice Department’s criminal head said banks may need to go beyond filing suspicious activity reports when they encounter a risky customer.

[Cheerio]

It’s utterly obscene. According to the Justice Department, going to the bank and withdrawing $5,000 should potentially prompt a banker to rat you out to the police.

This may be a very early form of capital controls in the Land of the Free. This is the subject of today’s Podcast. You can listen in here.

[Gen.Blather]

I sold a car and took $5,000 in cash to the bank. The teller had this wide-eyed look and I asked why. He said he wasn’t authorized to accept that much cash and he’d have to call his supervisor. He said it like he thought I’d just leave. I waited for the supervisor who looked at me and apparently said okay. She signed something for him. Needless to say I was surprised.

[grobdriver]

And why should my going to my bank and withdrawing, say, $20,000 from my savings to buy a vehicle (or anything) be any business of the state?

[C. Edmund Wright]

We started running into that at our bank shortly after Obama took over. It’s scary.....property rights? WTF is that anymore?

[GOPJ]

Is this in response to possible bank runs?

[C210N]

If there is an opening of the conservative legislative throttle in 2016, as there was in 2008 for the 'Rats, one item high on the agenda must be restoration of coupon bonds. This bond interest mechanism was one of the dominoes to fall about 40 years ago when the freedom to manage one's wealth was stolen.

[Cry if I Wanna]

Try to withdraw $5,000 from your bank on a Friday afternoon. They’ll say that they don’t have it.

[9thLife]

Stunning indeed. Something stunning happened at Bretton Woods 70 years ago, too, and it's still lying around unnoticed.

Mr. Durden finds everything stunning, doesn't he?

[9thLife]

So do it on Thursday.

[RushIsMyTeddyBear]

Bkmrk.

[certrtwngnut]

You can deposit or withdraw from your “OWN PERSONAL ACCOUNT” ven you show your papers.

[ClearCase_guy]

In today's world, sadly, $5000 doesn't seem like a tremendous amount of money. Of course, a lot of transactions are simply electronic, so a pile of cash may be an oddity -- but still, there are many things that cost $5000.

As the government gets more restrictive, and as the dollar buys less, soon the bank will have to fill out paperwork if you withdraw enough money to go to the movies.

[driftless2]

The government monitors large deposits of money to check on possible ill-gotten gains especially illegal drug deals. For example, how did the schoolteacher come into possession of a million dollars? As far as withdrawing large sums, I don’t know what their interest would be.

[9thLife]

[MHGinTN]

Why? well, because with the newest regulations signed by executive order of L4B, what you are calling ‘your savings’ is nothing but an IOU from the bank to whom you gave your earnings. You have no money in that account, just bank IOUs. Therefore, the regime will determine the efficacy of your use of those IOUs.

[9thLife]

[nomad]

Well then start stuffing your mattress.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

You got a SAR.

[grumpygresh]

The war on drugs is such a BS and passé justification for these SARs and civil forfeitures. The CIA ships in opium, and the DEA protects Latin Ameican drug cartels.
The Satanic Feds just want more money and power; this is just more oppression. This all correlates with more SWAT raids, more bullet buys, federalization of police and on and on.
If we do have a CW2, there might be a small window for a coup with a constitutional re-boot.

[Georgia Girl 2]

If you are still banking with one of the big 4-5 you need to reflect.

I bank with an International Asian commercial bank. They are not as Sig Heil as BOGA, Wells Fargo etc.