Banco Intercontinental (Baninter) was the second largest privately held commercial bank in the Dominican Republic before collapsing in 2003 in a spectacular fraud tied to political corruption. The resulting deficit of US$2.2B was equal to 12% to 15% of the Dominican national Gross Domestic Product. The size of the bank collapse and the mishandling of it by the administration of President Hipolito Mejia contributed materially to the Dominican economy entering a prolonged steep decline.-1... Rafael Hipólito Mejía Domínguez (born 22 February 1941, in Gurabo,Santiago de los Caballeros). ...
Leading up to Baninter's collapse, Dominican baseball great Sammy Sosa pitched the bank in a series of print and broadcast advertisements, proclaiming "solido, como Baninter", or "solid, like Baninter". Samuel Sosa Peralta, better known as Sammy Sosa (born November 12, 1968 in San Pedro de MacorÃs, Dominican Republic), is a professional Major League baseball player for the Baltimore Orioles. ...
According to the report and the support documents, officers of Baninter instructed their subordinates to erase from the books virtually all overdrafts, letters of credit advances, and special and confidential loans that had been granted to the leading shareholder of the bank and to people and companies with ties to him.
This imbalance emerges because the real assets of Baninter are greatly inferior to their liabilities, that is to say, the deposits and the debts that Baninter holds in the country and abroad.
Ramón Báez Figueroa has reported to the authorities that the vacuum was due to contributions that over the years Baninter had made to political parties and their leaders, the church, artists, journalists and to non-governmental organizations, such as foundations, associations and unions.
Ramón Báez Figueroa (born 1956) is the former president of Banco Intercontinental (Baninter) in the Dominican Republic and was accused in 2003 of masterminding the country's most spectacular banking fraud scandal amounting to USD$ 2.2 billion.
Báez Figueroa was arrested May 15, 2003 along with Baninter vice presidents Marcos Báez Cocco and Vivian Lubrano de Castillo, on charges he had schemed to embezzle RD$ 55 billion (USD $2.2 billion).
Rumors that Baninter might be in trouble began circulating during fall of 2002, and depositors started to withdraw their savings.
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