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Let me explain what's actually happening. Some context first. Lithuania's Central Bank (Lietuvos Bankas) is currently led by a rather modern team which create
by tasubotadas 8y ago
Let me explain what's actually happening.
Some context first.
Lithuania's Central Bank (Lietuvos Bankas) is currently led by a rather modern team which created a process that allows fintech companies to acquire "money institution" or bank licence in a sandboxed environment. That means that companies can only do non-risky business (like transfers) with a special oversight. LB was/is quite vocal about their interest in attracting companies from the UK in a post-brexit Europe as a banking licence in Lithuania is valid in the whole EU.
The person that leads the central bank is Vitas Vasiliauskas and he is strongly supported by the current president.
Quite a few companies have shown interest in this fast-tracked process (even Google opened their branch). Revolut was one of them, as it is really popular in Lithuania. I believe, that Lithuania is the third country by the number of Revolut users (a year ago 3% of the population were using Revolut).
The commission (The Commission of Budget and Finance) that's responsible for the investigation is lead by Stasys Jakeliūnas. He is a member of the current ruling pro-peasant party. The commission itself is a part of the parliament.
One of the other things that the commission is also currently investigating is the way the government has handled the crisis of 2008 and the role that the banks have played when interested rates were being adjusted. The government was led at that time by the current opposition.
The meat of the story.
Next month there is going to happen the elections for the parliament of the EU, and a few weeks after a presidential election. In 2020 MP elections are going to happen.
The current consensus is that whatever Mr Jakeliunas is doing is for the sake of the elections. Their (LŽVS - peasant) party electorate is rather uneducated and hates banks (banks=evil) in general so doing something against the banks is supposed to score points.
Since the current president supports the candidate that's not supported by LŽVS, going against LCB and Vasiliauskas is supposed to score some points for their candidate (or rather something against the other leading candidate). Also, they intend to score some points against the current opposition party which is leading the polls due to the supposed connection in mishandling the banks and the crisis itself in 2018.
Finally, since Revolut is backed by the investors (DSI Global) that are originally from Russia and one of the Revolut's founders is Russian that's another batch of free points because Lithuanian public hates Russia due to rather well-known reasons.
So just you know, LCB and VSD (Valstybės Saugumo Departamentas - CIA equivalent in LT) has done a thorough background check on Revolut and found no national security risks.
I hope this paints a much clearer picture and I didn't miss anything important.
TLDR; Jakeliunas is playing his part for the election and in the process of doing that he is doing irreparable damage to the global image of Lithuania.
- tasubotadas 8y agoWhat's also worth mentioning is that Jakeliunas applied to work for LCB more than once and was denied so there is a version of having a personal grudge against Vasiliauskas since Revolut is held as one of the success stories of the new policy.
- lnsru 8y agoSounds reasonable to me. Typical Lithuanian politics and a try to compromise ex-banker president candidate painting all financial institutions black.
- wfn 8y agoIt is probably best to avoid political commentary on HN but since you provided (one possible) political interpretation of these events which I am convinced is absolutely incorrect, I feel compelled to (merely - nothing more) note for others that it is just one possible interpretation; and that calling it the "consensus" is quite a stretch; even when one's scope is restricted to employees (past and present) within BoL. (I grant that yours is one possible narrative, of course). I will add a couple of notes here and will then suggest not to pursue the matter further, since its nature is both speculative and political. :) I will only ask you to consider -- > Next month there is going to happen the elections for the parliament of the EU, and a few weeks after a presidential election. In 2020 MP elections are going to happen. Consider observing how investigations will continue after the elections above (need to wait for that). (2020 elections... may as well say that everything is done as a function of the four year election cycle in that case, but that would be a bit moot, I would think). Also consider that the recession / VILIBOR etc. investigation conclusion dates were pushed ahead past the target May 2019 election dates (which had been agreed by a parliamentary vote back in 2018, voted for by opposition as well, including their main presidential candidate (she hadn't decided to go ahead with her candidacy back then), by the way) - and this push-ahead was an idea suggested and advocated by the chairman of the commission. P.S. besides VSD there is also FNTT, and FNTT has a pretty different (and rather bleak) outlook on these matters.
- tasubotadas 8y agoWhy should one avoid political commentary on HN? It's FULL of it. >"consensus" is quite a stretch Well, for everybody that's not related to LŽVS. >which I am convinced is absolutely incorrect You forgot to share the things why do you think that's incorrect.