Of all the scandals to emerge from the financial crisis of 2007-08, the rigging of interbank interest rates by traders at Barclays, RBS, Deutsche Bank and others is perhaps the most cynical and shocking. Yet for many people, the nature of these interest rates, their history and the means by which they were manipulated remain unclear. In this book, Oonagh McDonald provides the most comprehensive account of the scandal yet written. Beginning with a brief history of banking regulation in the UK, she explains the origins of the different rates or ‘fixes’ – LIBOR, FOREX and precious metals – showing how they emerged from London’s establishment as a global financial centre in the nineteenth century. She then presents the evidence for manipulation, drawing on documents from financial regulators as well as the traders’ own, frequently colourful exchanges. Finally, she examines why existing regulation failed and assesses the value of subsequent reforms, laying out her own recommendations for better regulating benchmarks in a world of rapidly developing markets and technology. Though banks have been fined and a few traders have been jailed, justice will not be done until senior bankers are made responsible for their actions. Provocative and rigorously argued, this book makes concrete recommendations for improving the security of the financial services industry and holding bankers to account.

Holding bankers to account: A decade of market manipulation, regulatory failures and regulatory reforms PDF

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