The sad story of Malak banks/ hoarding of 30 thousand empty housing units by 3 state banks
According to Iran Economist, the financial statements of state-owned companies in the last 5 years show that two state-owned banks have the most human resources among state-owned companies, and the names of two state-owned banks are among the 10 largest companies in terms of the number of employees. On the other hand, in terms of the size of the bank’s assets in the balance sheet, out of 10 large state-owned companies, 7 are state-owned bank companies, whose total assets reach more than 2,400,000 billion tomans.
“Banks make a mistake in investing with people’s money”; This sentence is a part of the speech of the leader of the revolution in 1997, who correctly warned about the corporatism of the country’s banks, a warning that became the main slogan of the controversial billboard “Mellak Banks” in Shahrivar 1402; The billboard that came on September 27 and went away a few days later due to what was called pressure from the banks! A trend that shows that banks, in addition to the enterprise that discontent in the banking network and the weakening of production is only part of its losses, apparently have also found the mafia and the ability to deal with any power.
However, what is not paid attention to, was the emphasis of the leader of the revolution on the corporate ownership of all banks, both private and state, not only private banks, which the House of Designers of the Islamic Revolution, affiliated to the Ouj organization, cleverly placed in this billboard! It should be noted that in the same year when the leadership’s statements regarding bank ownership were raised, Ansar Bank, which is affiliated with special institutions like the apex organization, (now along with the Laws Bank and other military banks under the Sepeh Bank) was one of the banks. who is publicly proud of his entrepreneurship and introduces Iranian Atlas Holding on his website and brags about it.
In the same year, the Student News Agency criticized Ansar Bank in a report and claimed that it owns 33% of the shares of Arya Imran Pars Planning and Development Company, 30% of the shares of Benagastran Eighth Tos Company and 50% of the shares of Atlas Pardis Company, and this is almost all It undertakes activities related to construction projects. Atlas Farmanieh residential building and Atlas Mall were among the extensive projects of this holding affiliated to Ansar Bank.
Mallak banks are not only private banks!
It seems that the billboard of the apex organization, which cleverly used the word leadership in favor of some and against others, is a part of a propaganda procedure that has been busy creating and establishing a false perception about the country’s banking system for the past few months. He thinks that private banks are the cause of the country’s economic problems, so they should either be dissolved or come under the control and authority of the government!
Iran’s economy is probably one of the most bank-oriented economies in the world, because the high influence of banks in all aspects of the economy and its direction is quite evident. The reason is the full and complete access of banks to monetary resources, which can easily take over the direction of credits for special interests, interests that can both be in the direction of the growth of the economy and its destruction! This is where the corporate governance of banks, which has always been the question of critics of the banking system, comes into question. A company is an organization whose goal is to earn profit, and if we exclude certain development banks, all banks aim to have a positive financial balance and gain and profit.
To put it more simply, the entry of banks into areas such as housing, gold and coins to earn profit is considered entrepreneurship. However, banks are responsible for providing financial services to people, not using people’s capital to earn financial profit for themselves! But what is the result of the banking of banks? Not only this activity of the banks is not productive and does not benefit the country’s economic system, but the assets produced in the banks are frozen and hoarded and the banks are forced to print money, a process that further increases inflation and takes away the purchasing power of the people. The approach that banks also implemented in the field of housing and played a small but effective role in creating the related crisis.
However, in Iran’s banking system, policymakers’ mismanagement and bad decisions, such as setting the ceiling for the interest rate of facilities in previous years or debt facilities and many other factors, brought the country’s banking system into disharmony. Surveys show that despite reducing the problems of the banking system to private banks, state banks are also involved in the current situation.
According to the data of Dunya Ekhtaz newspaper, the financial statements of state-owned companies in the last 5 years show that two state-owned banks have the most human resources among state-owned companies, and the names of two state-owned banks are among the 10 largest companies in terms of the number of employees. On the other hand, in terms of the size of the bank’s assets in the balance sheet, out of 10 large state-owned companies, 7 are state-owned bank companies, whose total assets reach more than 2,400,000 billion tomans. This is despite the fact that not only the names of these banks are not seen in the list of top 10 state-owned companies in terms of profitability, but the names of two state-owned banks are also visible in the list of 10 loss-making state-owned companies.
House keeping banks!
It has been several years now that people’s capital has become a support for banks to enter the housing market and disrupt its balance with a factor such as hoarding.
Unfortunately, accurate and comprehensive data on the name and impact of banks, especially governments and organizations, have not been recorded in the category of banking. In the meantime, some conclusions can be reached by tracking the statements of official officials.
A bank that has a thousand empty residential units!
According to the statistics announced by Jam Jam, between 1 and 2.5 million units of empty houses have been hoarded by banks. However, the banking system claims that the label of hoarding empty houses does not stick to them. However, Mahmoud Mahmudzadeh, the Deputy Minister of Housing and Construction of the Ministry of Roads and Urban Development, announced last year that 200,000 empty houses belong to real people, and one of the country’s banks alone has 1,000 empty residential units.
Also, Mohammadreza Jamshidi, the secretary of the Private Banks Association, said that there are as many empty houses as there are bank branches. About 22,000 bank branches are active in the country, and there are the same number and eventually twice as many residential units; One belongs to the head of the branch and the other is offered to the employees in the form of guest house, but this is not related to private banks.
In August 2009, the head of the Real Estate Consultants Union claimed that empty houses in Iran belong to banks and state-owned companies, and small owners cannot be the cause of hoarding.
On August 5 of this year, Mojtaba Yousefi, a member of the Majlis Civil Commission, criticized some state banks and emphasized that “three banks, Mellat, Maskan, and Melli, have more than 30,000 empty houses!”
If until now, banks used to purchase property under the pretext of providing support to the central bank, now they have realized the high profit for themselves. Some market participants even say that housing prices are set by banks so that they can increase their profits.
Also, while there were claims about empty residential properties in banks Mellat, Sepeh and Maskan, the Public Relations and Information Center of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance clarified about it and claimed that according to Bank Mellat’s announcement, the total number of residential properties of Bank Mellat is 726 There are 615 occupied properties and only 111 vacant properties.
According to Sepeh Bank, the total residential properties of this bank are 2,658 properties, of which 1,467 are surplus properties and 1,190 are non-surplus properties. The number of uninhabited properties of the bank is 319, some of the mentioned properties belong to the banks and the integration institution affiliated to the armed forces, after the bank meeting, the assignment of these properties will be determined through auction. Other properties are the upper units of Sepeh Bank branches, which were generally purchased in the past years together with the branch property, which can be separated from the branch due to security and protection issues and due to the laws and regulations of the relevant authorities (municipality, prevention police, etc.) It is not considered as a residential unit.
Also, according to the announcement of Maskan Bank, the total number of units with residential use of this bank is 735 units, of which 124 are independent units (with separate documents) and the other 611 units are the upper floors of bank branches, and all of these units are for the accommodation of non-resident employees and colleagues. The native transferred to that city is used for the maintenance and support of branches and the use of auditors and inspectors, and it is not possible to hand it over to others. Data that does not violate the corporate governance of these banks.
The pain of the housing market is more rooted than the banking sector
We know that banks, by receiving double profits from granting loans for buying and renting housing, playing a role in the exchange rate, inflation rate and interest rate of facilities have significant and harmonious effects on all the coefficients and variables of housing, which this same function along with investing in this area (housing enterprise) ) are ultimately effective on the regional gross production of housing and increasing the price of this consumer product and turning it into a capital product. But that’s not all.
In the last 40 years, housing prices have increased more than 3 thousand times. Experts believe that the root of the crisis of the housing market should be found in the 80s, at the same time as the lack of supply of urban land for housing construction, the forcing of municipalities for financial independence through density sales, and then the entry of banks into this field in the 90s. . In fact, the beginning of million-dollar prices in the housing market happened in the country in 1985. After that, with a gentle slope until 2087, the price reached the border of two million and in 2011, the price crossed the border of three million tomans. In the following years, until 1995, due to the decrease in inflation, housing prices did not go away from their upward movement.
In the years 1992 to 1995, growth was at a slower pace than other years in this period. In 1401, the average price of housing in Tehran was recorded at nearly 30 million tomans per square meter. Also in 1402, the average housing price in Tehran was announced at the border of 90 to 100 million tomans per square meter. (This is the average price of all urban areas).
In the meantime, the government’s approach to solve the housing crisis, such as rent-to-own, Mehr Housing Plan, or the National Housing Plan, did not have much effect in controlling the market due to inappropriate and unprincipled location. However, during these years, housing prices sometimes did not grow in line with the inflation rate, and the lack of housing compared to market needs, the growth of material prices, lack of sales by sellers, and population growth also played a key role in the current state of the housing market. Now the shadow of recession is weighing on the housing market.
Transactions and construction have reached the lowest levels in the past few years and the continuation of this situation will only lead to a greater gap between supply and demand and imbalance in the housing market. A path that neither meaningful media advertisements nor misdirecting people will lead to the right destination, nor advertising billboards that come and go every few days.