ING

The European Central Bank is concerned about Dutch bank ING's ability to handle a hard Brexit, according to a report in FD. Sources told the financial newspaper that ING is being pressured to at least partially roll-back a 2016 decision to move dozens of trading desk staffers to their large office in London.

The new concern is that ING will lose access to some financial markets if Brexit continues to progress.

The VAT increase next year will increase costs for Dutch households by an average of around 300 euros per year, according to ING economists. The low VAT rate will increase from 6 to 9 percent on January 1st, which is expected to increase inflation by 0.6 percent extra, ANP reports.

Around 30 thousand ING and Volksbank clients are getting money back from their bank. These involve homeowners who paid too much on their mortgage between 2011 and 2016 or who had their interest adjusted, and therefore had to pay a too high penalty interest, RTL Nieuws reports.

The banks calculated a penalty interest on the adjustment due to lost interest income. But complaints revealed that the calculation of the penalty interest was always in the favor of the bank. Banks are allowed to impose a penalty interest, but it may not exceed the actual damage that they suffer.

Jeroen van der Veer, president of ING's board of commissioners, again defended the bank's now scrapped plan to increase the salary of CEO Ralph Hamers from 2 million to 3 million euros per year.

Dutch bank ING managed to track down the fault that resulted in 3 million transactions being processed twice. The bank reversed the double payments and by now all customers should have their money back, RTL Nieuws reports.

ING decided to withdraw a proposed salary increase for CEO Ralph Hamers due to mass criticism from society and politicians. "We realize that we underestimated the public response in the Netherlands to this clearly sensitive issue", chairman of the supervisory board Jeroen van der Veer said in a statement on Tuesday, ANP reports.

GroenLinks wants to block a massive salary increase for ING CEO Mark Hamers with a legislative amendment. Party leader Jesse Klaver hopes to pass this law through parliament and the Senate as quickly as possible, so that it can be submitted to the Council of State for urgent advice this week. ING shareholders will discuss the proposed increase on April 23rd, ANP reports. 

Large Dutch banks invested billions in the meat industry over the past years, and a large part of that money went to companies where animal welfare is not in order, according to a new report by Eerlijke Bankwijzer. These include companies that sell battery farm chickens, keep their sows locked up in cages, or slaughter animals in controversial ways, RTL Nieuws reports.

The Eerlijke Bankwijzer, or Fair Bank Guide, looks at whether Dutch banks invest their money responsibly. Amnesty International, FNV, Mileudefensie and Oxfam Novib, among others, contribute to it.

An 18-year-old Oosterhout man arrested in connection with DDoS attacks on Dutch financial institutions, wanted "to show that a teenager can simply crash all banks with a relatively simple attack", suspect Jelle S. wrote in an email to the Volkskrant shorty before his arrest.

ABN Amro, ING, Rabobank and the Tax Authority again faced DDoS attacks on Tuesday, though this time the financial services managed to deter them better than over the weekend. The attacks caused a short disruption in payment system iDeal, but the problems were quickly restored, NOS reports.

ABN Amro was troubled by attacks all day long, but they were mostly successfully fought off, a spokesperson said to the broadcaster. Around 5:30 p.m. the bank faced a short disruption.

The Dutch Tax Authority was hit by a DDoS attack on Monday, NOS reports. According to the tax service, its site was difficult to reach for a time on Monday morning, but everything should be working again. Three Dutch banks also faced such cyber attacks since Saturday.