Thursday 28 June 2012

CFTC orders Barclays to pay $200 million civil monetary penalty.


CFTC finds that Barclays attempted to manipulate interest rates and made related false reports to benefit its derivatives trading positions

The Order also finds that Barclays made false LIBOR reports at the direction of members of senior management to protect its reputation during the global financial crisis

As the Order shows, Barclays, in pursuit of its own self-interest, disregarded the fundamental principle that LIBOR and Euribor are supposed to reflect the costs of borrowing funds in certain markets. Barclays’ traders located at least in New York, London and Tokyo asked Barclays’ submitters to submit particular rates to benefit their derivatives trading positions, such as swaps or futures positions, which were priced on LIBOR and Euribor. Barclays’ traders made these unlawful requests routinely, and sometimes daily, from at least mid-2005 through at least the fall of 2007, and sporadically thereafter into 2009. The Order relates that, for example, one trader stated in an email to a submitter: 
“We have another big fixing tom[orrow] and with the market move I was hoping we could set [certain] Libors as high as possible.”
The traders’ requests were frequently accepted by Barclays’ submitters, who emailed responses such as;
 “always happy to help,” “for you, anything,” or “Done…for you big boy,” 
resulting in false submissions by Barclays to the BBA and EBF. The traders and submitters also engaged in similar conduct on fewer occasions with respect to Yen and Sterling LIBOR.



Monday 11 June 2012

The Greatest Movie Ever Sold

Currently watching The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, a movie about marketing, product placement, sponsorship and endorsement in the movie business.
So far, Morgan Spurlock takes the same stance as in Super Size Me - creates a documentary that reveals the status-quo by taking it to extremes. Spurlock's proposal meeting with Sheetz clarifies what The Greatest Movie Ever Sold is about, they asked him:
"Is there a plot?"
"The plot is literally me trying to find the people to support a film like this, that talks about the topic, that is. This is the movie right now! This is it!"
I'm going to watch the rest now, want to add an image from the poster but I'm going to try not to read the logos on Spurlock because I'd rather follow the 'plot'.




Thursday 7 June 2012

Hold on!

On hold.
Wonder how many cumulative hours are spent in the UK each day with people being on hold to one another to discuss paperwork, official data or bureaucratic details?
Too many.