{"id":58526,"date":"2015-05-25T12:00:44","date_gmt":"2015-05-25T11:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=58526"},"modified":"2015-05-22T14:28:05","modified_gmt":"2015-05-22T13:28:05","slug":"banksters-mafia-orgy-major-world-banks-hit-by-record-fine-for-rigging-forex-markets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2015\/05\/banksters-mafia-orgy-major-world-banks-hit-by-record-fine-for-rigging-forex-markets\/","title":{"rendered":"[Banksters Mafia Orgy] Major World Banks Hit by Record Fine for Rigging Forex Markets"},"content":{"rendered":"

Five banks to pay billions and plead guilty in currency and interest rate cases. <\/em>Barclays, RBS, Citi, JP Morgan and UBS forced to pay out over collusion by traders in several countries in another big blow to their reputations.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"US<\/a>

The US attorney general, Loretta Lynch, gets tough with \u2018the cartel\u2019 of international banks. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst\/Reuters<\/p><\/div>\n

The reputation of the banking industry took another hammering on Wednesday [20 May 2015] as record fines imposed on major banks \u2013 including Barclays and bailed-out Royal Bank of Scotland<\/a> \u2013 for rigging foreign exchange markets topped \u00a36.3bn. [\u20ac 8.8bn] [US$ 9.86bn]<\/p>\n

The US Department of Justice accused the industry of \u201cbreathtaking flagrancy\u201d as, along with other regulators on both sides of the Atlantic, it imposed a record $5.7bn (\u00a33.7bn) of punishments on six banks. The new fines followed\u00a32.6bn <\/a>of penalties announced in November for manipulation of the \u00a33.5tn a day currency markets.<\/p>\n

Barclays<\/a> was fined \u00a31.5bn by five regulators, including a record \u00a3284m by the UK\u2019s Financial Conduct Authority. The FCA will hand its fine to the chancellor, George Osborne. Yet Barclays\u2019 stock market value rose by \u00a31.5bn as a result of a 3% rise in its share price amid relief the fine was not even larger. RBS\u2019s shares also rose 1.8%. The increases came even though the regulators said there could be more fines to come.<\/p>\n

An unprecedented series of guilty pleas was extracted by the US DoJ from four of the banks: Barclays, RBS, Citigroup and JP Morgan. Swiss bank UBS was granted immunity for being the first to report the manipulation of the foreign exchange markets, although it was forced to admit to wrongdoing<\/a> in other offences. Bank of America was fined by the Federal Reserve.<\/p>\n

Announcing the fines, Loretta Lynch, the US attorney general, said bank traders had exhibited \u201cbreathtaking flagrancy\u201d in setting up a group they called \u201cthe cartel\u201d to manipulate the market between 2007 and the end of 2013.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe penalty these banks will now pay is fitting considering the long-running and egregious nature of their anticompetitive conduct. It is commensurate with the pervasive harm done. And it should deter competitors in the future from chasing profits without regard to fairness, to the law, or to the public welfare,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The banks, which have been hit by billions of pounds of Libor fines in the last three years and admit they face further penalties for rigging other markets such as metals, faced a torrent of criticism.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis sort of practice strikes at the heart of business ethics and is yet another blow to the integrity of the banks. Our pension funds invest billions of pounds in the financial markets and if they are being cheated in this way, it affects every one of us,\u201d said Mark Taylor, dean of Warwick Business School and a former foreign exchange trader.<\/p>\n

Andrew McCabe, FBI assistant director, said: \u201cThese resolutions make clear that the US government will not tolerate criminal behaviour in any sector of the financial markets.\u201d<\/p>\n

Campaigners for a tax on financial transactions at the Robin Hood Tax campaign, said: \u201cThese colossal fines are a shocking reminder that for too long our banks have had a rotten core. In what other sector would we tolerate the frequency and severity of such damaging behaviour?\u201d<\/p>\n

Barclays was ordered to fire eight staff as part of a deal with the New York department of financial services \u2013 including a global head of trading \u2013 although other individuals are also expected to leave. Benjamin Lawsky, who is stepping down as the head of the New York DFS, said Barclays \u201cengaged in a brazen \u2018heads I win, tails you lose\u2019 scheme to rip off their clients\u201d.<\/p>\n

The FCA said Barclays engaged in collusive behaviour with rivals and used chat rooms to manipulate rates secretly. In one chat room, a trader described himself and his fellow participants as \u201cthe three musketeers\u201d and said \u201c<\/em>we all die together\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n

Georgina Philippou, the FCA\u2019s acting director of enforcement and market oversight, said of the Barclays fines: \u201cThis is another example of a firm allowing unacceptable practices to flourish on the trading floor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Top bankers lined up to offer apologies and their frustrations. Antony Jenkins, appointed to run Barclays in the wake of the 2012 Libor rigging scandal, said: \u201cI share the frustration of shareholders and colleagues that some individuals have once more brought our company and industry into disrepute.\u201d<\/p>\n

As RBS was fined \u00a3430m \u2013 on top of the \u00a3400m of penalties announced in November \u2013 boss Ross McEwan said: <\/strong>\u201c<\/em>The serious misconduct that lies at the heart of today\u2019s announcements has no place in the bank that I am building. Pleading guilty for such wrongdoing is another stark reminder of how badly this bank lost its way and how important it is for us to regain trust.\u201d<\/p>\n

RBS, which is 79% owned by taxpayers, warned it could still face further action and has fired three people and suspended two more.<\/p>\n

Citigroup was fined \u00a3770m, while JP Morgan<\/a>, the biggest bank in the US \u2013 which has paid fines totalling more than \u00a326bn since 2009 \u2013 was fined another \u00a3572m. Its boss, Jamie Dimon, said: \u201cThe conduct described in the government\u2019s pleadings is a great disappointment to us. We demand and expect better of our people. The lesson here is that the conduct of a small group of employees, or of even a single employee, can reflect badly on all of us, and have significant ramifications for the entire firm.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barclays also became the first bank to be fined for fixing another benchmark, known as the ISDAfix. It is paying \u00a374m to the US regulator the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.<\/p>\n

What Is Forex and Why Does It Matter?<\/a><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 theguardian.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The reputation of the banking industry took another hammering on Wednesday [20 May 2015] as record fines imposed on Barclays, Royal Bank of Scotland, Citi, JP Morgan and UBS, which pleaded guilty for rigging foreign exchange markets and over collusion by traders in several countries, topped [\u00a36.3bn.] [\u20ac 8.8bn.] [US$ 9.86bn.].<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-capitalism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58526\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}