Chile: BBVA joins lawsuit against BancoEstado’s alleged abuses

Chilean banks BICE, Security and Internacional have gained a new ally in their lawsuit against the state bank BancoEstado for abuse of dominant position. International banks Scotiabank, and now BBVA, have joined their suit against the State lender.

BancoEstado has justified their collection of differentiated tariffs by alleging the need to make up for coverage, claiming that among the three banks initial plaintiff banks, “there is one that has only 9 branches and one that has around 28. They are only present in a dozen of the 346 communes of the country. ”

“The way in which BancoEstado operates the RUT Account is characterized by greater laxity and informality, since, as its representatives have publicly stated,” it does not include income or background requirements, only an identity card is needed “, being offered as a ‘universal access transaction account’. On the other hand, private banks are subject to strict control” said BBVA in joining the move against BancoEstado.

In it’s own lawsuit, Scotiabank argued that “in effect, BancoEstado has indicated that the charges it makes to Scotiabank are several times larger than the cost of providing these services, […] which would be justified to finance the expansion of its own service network … In other words The State Bank recognizes that it charges several times the cost of the service, but alleges that it needs that income to finance itself “.

Full Content: Pulso

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