Wall St Nemesis Joins House Panel Deutsche Bank Probe

Joining me is Greg Farrell, Bloomberg News legal reporter. Greg tell us a little bit about his personality, obviously, his prosecutor personality and his investigation style. Well, first of all, he's not a prosecutor. He's an investigator. He's very deliberate. He's actually um very much a plane. Uh, he doesn't stick out. If he didn't, you know, if it didn't have this type of job, I'm not sure you would

have heard of me. He's not a flamboyant guy. He does not call attention to himself, but he's very deliberate. He's almost a nerd when it comes to pouring over documents and being very thorough about whatever the subject he's done, and based on his track record, I think he's quite skeptical of a lot of big banks, and you know their ability to comply with the law. You need a nerd for this kind of investigation. Tell us about some

of his past investigations for the Senate. Well, the first time I came across him was on Planet Enron, which I covered in a previous life many years ago, and I went to hear the presentation that the Senate Permanent p s I, the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, had done on loans from JP Morgan Chase and City Group to Enron, and I, if I recall correctly because it was many years ago, the substance of that was that Enron borrowed money but then claimed it put it on its income

statement as revenue as opposed to debt, or it's bound and revenue as opposed to debt. A big no no. And the bank's basically allowed this to happen or didn't, even though it seemed that they should have known. And

it was quite a thorough impressive investigation. Other people, including the Manhattan District Attorney, also glommed onto this um and you could tell this guy was driven by trying to find you know, what had actually happened, as opposed to back then there was a lot of Uh, there was a circus light atmosphere, particularly among Democrats in Washington, regarding ken Lay and ken Lay's relationship with President George W. Bush and his father. Roach did not play in that

game at all. He was just very specific about these loans. Uh. The the bad guy, if you will, on those deals were the big banks, and he was there to castigate them for, you know, basically entering into these deals without you know, doing their own due diligence. I covered the trial and the circus like atmosphere continued throughout. Now he's already investigate as you mentioned banks and Deutsche Bank. What is the committee planning to investigate here? Do we know

what their investigation will be focusing on? Only what Adam Schiff had said last week. It's one of the few public statements he and Congresswoman Waters have made, is that they will be looking into basically personal not personal business deals, but business deals between the Trump organization and Russia and looking for any threads from Russia that tie into Trump as candidate, Trump as real estate developer. Uh. License or etcetera. Um,

that was Shift statement. I think, um, you know, Congressman Waters is being careful. She sent out a series of letters when she was in the minority two years ago that went nowhere. She she asked Deutsche Bank for you know, information about client, you know, Donald J. Trump, for a couple of loans that the bank had extended in for the Post Office hotel in Washington, UHD Rale golf course in Florida, as well as the Chicago Tower, and because she didn't have the power of subpoena, the bank did

not have to respond. Um. She then sent a few subsequent letters basically trying to push the Republican chairman of the committee to do something, and then push the House to do something, and that didn't go anywhere. I think she wants to be very careful here. I think she and Adam Shift realized that, um, this can't be just an open ended fishing trip. That will be a poor use of time in the next six to nine months,

and then presidential election season is on next year. So I think she wants to be strategic and bring roach in will help with that effort. I think the question is how much patient patients she and Schiff have. I think they want to show some results during this calendar year and not have something come out, you know, a year from now. She was particularly criticized and picked on by President Trump. Um. And so do you think that partisanship will end to into this at some point? So

they say it won't. I think that's a balancing a fine line and a balancing act for her because she does not want it will not be in the interests of the committee for her to appear to be partisan. So um. And, like I say, I think so far that's the you know, the the line she's taken. The President has been very successful at baiting some of his enemies into responses, bating some of his enemies into doing things they wouldn't do, targeting people, and then provoking the

reaction that does not make them look better. And Congressman Waters has so far stayed above the fray to her credit. And Roach, how is he likely to handle this in a nonpart bipartisan way, um, in a nonpartisan way? So um. We had a good quote from a Republican named Gary Brown who talked about Roach being very like nonpartisan. He will go where the facts are and um, which is

the type of person. It basically adds to the credibility of the investigation that they brought someone in who's well known as a very thorough, fact based um investigator and not someone who's there just to basically toss bombs, uh, you know, into the news cycle every day. Now you write that the committee is also looking for someone with a background in investigative reporting, well that that brings up

a lot of ideas. It does, but I think you know, the way this gets described to us, it doesn't necessarily mean they're looking for an investigative reporter. I think, you know, like any committee, they're going to be doing a report that wants them help. What better way to look than a young, aggressive reporter who can weave something together into a bigger story whatever it is that they're going to write.

They wanted to be convincing and compelling and make people read it, So I think I would look at it that way, rather than an actual plan where they put a help wanted sign out for an investigative reporter. They just want someone who's good with words and can sort of see the bigger picture to be able to describe this in a good way. And maybe that person is on staff already be great to have a report that was written in that way. Right now, just tell us a little bit Deutsche Bank. We have a been a

minute here. Deutsche Bank has been investigated and over and over. It's hard to keep tracking them. Just tell us about the biggest investigations in about a minute. Well, they've been investigated. They have five counting five separate monitors for various issues.

But the most important thing I think we should keep an eye on is an investigation into uh a scandal known as the mirror trading scandal that took place in Russia in Moscow in over a period of several years around The bank allowed some very wealthy Russians to trade basically approximately more than twelve billion dollars worth buying shares in Moscow and then selling them simultaneously in London, irrespective of whether or not their good investments, just to get

many out of the country. And the UK has settled with the bank over this. The New York State Banking Regulator has settled with Deutsche Bank, but not the Justice Department. So it would be interesting to see what happens if the DJ ever does lower the hammer on Deutsche Bank for that fascinating article, and you know so much about financial crime. Gregg Farrell, Bloomberg mus Legal reporter. Thanks for

listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, and on bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brosso. This is Bloomberg