Rakesh Saxena - Bangkok Bank of Commerce

Bangkok Bank of Commerce

In 1989, Saxena became advisor to Krirk-kiat Jalichandra, new senior vice-president of Bangkok Bank of Commerce. The bank tried hostile takeovers against many of the large Thai companies that traded publicly on the stock exchange. According to later investigation, it also gave cheap loans to various public officials and politicians in India, Russia, Thailand, Sinagapore, Saudi Arabia and Lebanon.

Bangkok Bank of Commerce collapsed in 1996 and the Bank of Thailand took it over. The collapse contributed to the Asian financial recession, economic and political crisis and the 1997 devaluation of the baht. Saxena was at his residence in Prague or Zurich at the time the story broke, and he never returned to Thailand.

In June 1996, Thai authorities charged Saxena, Krikkiat Jalichandre, Rajan Pillai and Adnan Khashoggi and a number of other people with embezzling money estimated to be worth $US2.2 billion (or according to other estimates, $US88 million). Saxena himself had allegedly siphoned off £300 million in 1992-1993 through a string of derivative transactions. Saxena said that he was just an advisor and a trader and that the collapse of the real estate markets was the real trigger of the recession. His relationship with Russian tycoons and Arab sheikhs continues to be a subject of speculation.