DNinja69 - I give you credit for doing some homework and looking up what Deutsche Bank testified to at trial. Unfortunately I don't think you are interpreting it correctly. Like eye, you still seem emotionally glued to the idea that - "dammit, trump lied and this is our chance to ruin him!"
Here's what you quoted the Deutsche Bank executive as saying at trial:
"In 2019, for example, Trump’s financial statement listed his net worth at $5.8 billion, which the bank adjusted down to $2.5 billion."
Originally Posted by DNinja69
The bank took Trump's numbers and gave them a 57% haircut! What does that tell you?
I can think of plenty of reasons they knocked down the numbers, and not just because Trump inflated them. As our friend Kevin O'Leary (aka Mr. Wonderful) noted, “Every single real estate developer everywhere on earth does this! The bank ALWAYS negotiates with you. Everybody understands how this works... this is a joke!”
If you read Judge Kangaroo's opinion, he claims the bank "relied" on the allegedly inflated Statement of Financial Condition (SFC) in crafting the loan terms it offered Trump. Yeah, they relied on the SFC to list and identify all of the Trump Organization's major assets & liabilities. They clearly DIDN'T rely on it for the valuations they assigned internally to said assets & liabilities.
Your claim that "hundreds of millions in excess gains were skimmed by fudging some numbers" is complete bullshit. You already showed us that Deutsche Bank knocked down the numbers by a whopping 57%. There was ZERO evidence presented at trial that Deutsche Bank would have charged a higher interest rate or otherwise tightened its loan terms if the SFCs had not been arguably inflated.
When they approve loans, banks look at various sources of repayment. Cashflow from operations is always the primary source, followed by secondary and tertiary repayment sources. SFC assets are usually regarded as a 3rd or 4th potential source of repayment. No prudent lender approves or prices a loan based on the value of the assets listed on a guarantor's SFC. They're largely immaterial. Why? Because the last thing a lender wants to do is take possession of a borrower's assets and go through the time-consuming headache of selling them (usually in a down market) in order to recoup a loan. If you have any banker friends, ask them and they will confirm everything I just wrote.