Latest news with #rate-rigging
Telegraph
5 days ago
- Business
- Telegraph
Trader wrongly jailed for rate-rigging may sue for millions
A former Libor trader jailed for rate-rigging is considering suing for compensation after his conviction was quashed by the Supreme Court. Tom Hayes, who served five and a half years in prison for fraud, said he would seek legal advice on bringing civil claims after his 2015 conviction was overturned on Wednesday. Possible targets of legal action could include the banks that employed him before he was arrested. Mr Hayes said: 'Whether I have any civil claims against any parties is yet to be determined. I'm not ruling it out, but I don't have sufficient information yet. I need to take advice. 'I can't at this moment in time know what I'm going to do. All I would say is that everyone in the US who had their convictions overturned, almost to a man, sued their former employer banks and reached settlements.' Karen Todner, Mr Hayes's lawyer, said he was investigating whether to bring a possible claim against various authorities. She said there was a high probability he would launch a claim. Lawyers said Mr Hayes could potentially win millions in compensation from various parties involved in the case, including the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), which prosecuted him, and his ex-employers, based on loss of earnings.
BBC News
5 days ago
- Business
- BBC News
What next after City rate-rigging convictions quashed?
After a decade-long legal battle, two former City traders who were at the centre of one of the biggest scandals of the financial crisis have had their rate-rigging convictions Hayes and Carlo Palombo were jailed following trials for manipulating the interest rates used for loans between banks, known as Tuesday, their convictions were overturned in a ruling that raises many questions. Could Hayes and Palombo claim compensation? In the UK, defendants who have had their convictions overturned due to a miscarriage of justice can potentially claim compensation. But it is not key factor determining eligibility is whether the overturned conviction was deemed "unsafe" and whether a new or newly discovered fact proves innocence "beyond reasonable doubt".If those conditions are met, compensation may be awarded by the Ministry of Justice, but even then, deductions for living expenses during imprisonment may Hayes told BBC's Newsnight on Wednesday: "It would be great to get some compensation, but I won't get any from the British government. I've made peace with that."There could be another way. After a US court threw out their rate-rigging convictions three and a half years ago, defendants including former Deutsche Bank trader, Matt Connolly, and his British former colleague, Gavin Black, sued their former employer for malicious prosecution, later agreeing confidential settlements. Could other convicted traders appeal? Seven other traders, who were sentenced to jail for rigging interest rates, are expected to do Hayes' conviction in 2015, all the brokers he was alleged to have conspired with to manipulate interest rates were acquitted in a separate in 2016, three former Barclays traders – Jay Merchant, Jonathan Mathew and Alex Pabon – were convicted of manipulating Libor. Together with Peter Johnson, who had pleaded guilty before the trial, they were given prison sentences in July 2016 ranging from two years and nine months to six serving out their time and emerging from jail, they are now taking advice from lawyers and are likely to apply to the Criminal Cases Review Commission to refer their cases back to the Court of the Supreme Court has now ruled in Hayes and Palombo's favour, that is likely to be a straightforward process compared to the seven-year struggle of Hayes to convince the CCRC to refer his case. Other questions to be answered Mr Hayes has said he wants to see "a public inquiry into how what happened to us happened"."How was the Court of Appeal continually able to frustrate attempts to get this matter heard by the Supreme Court?" he Palombo said he "100%" believed he was the scapegoat for the anti-bank backlash following the 2008 financial crash. He questioned why he, as a junior trader at Barclays, was singled politicians including David Davis, John McDonnell and Lord Tyrie, who conducted a short parliamentary inquiry into Libor manipulation in 2012, have said there should be a public have argued in particular for a probe of the interest rate manipulation ordered by banks' senior managers, under pressure from central banks and governments including the Bank of England, as exposed the BBC Radio 4 series The Lowball are also questions about how the Serious Fraud Office also took most of its evidence from external lawyers hired by Barclays, UBS or Deutsche Bank to investigate of the reasons Connolly and Black brought the cases is that a judge in the US ruled that US prosecutors at the Department of Justice had "outsourced" their investigation to the target of the investigation – Deutsche Bank. Allowing banks to investigate themselves by employing external law, firms who then handed over evidence to the US Department of Justice, put employers in a "uniquely coercive position" towards employees, ruled judge Colleen McMahon.
BBC News
6 days ago
- Business
- BBC News
Why have bankers had convictions quashed and what happens next?
Two former City traders, Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo, have had their convictions for rate-rigging overturned by the UK's Supreme were convicted and jailed for manipulating the interest rates used for loans between banks, which dictate borrowing costs for the likes of mortgages and car finance what is rate-rigging and what happens next? Why were the Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo jailed? Mr Hayes and Mr Palombo were among 37 City traders prosecuted for manipulating the rate benchmarks, Libor and were used to track the cost of borrowing cash between banks and to set the interest rates on millions of mortgages and commercial part they were accused, by their actions, of adding to the 2008 financial crisis, which Mr Hayes said after his conviction was quashed that they had "literally nothing to do with".Libor has now been discontinued, while Euribor is being Hayes was accused of being the "ringmaster" of an international fraud conspiracy to influence these rates to benefit the banks' was the first banker to be jailed for rate-rigging in 2015, and was initially given a 14-year sentence, later reduced to 11 years, of which he served Palumbo was jailed for four years in 2019. What did they argue? Mr Hayes did not deny that while at UBS, and subsequently at Citibank, he attempted to manipulate the Libor he said that it was common practice at the banks where he worked and that his superiors were aware of what he was argued he was being made the scapegoat for the actions of an Palombo, a former Barclays trader, also argued that it was normal commercial practice. How wide-spread were rate-rigging convictions? In criminal trials on both sides of the Atlantic from 2015 to 2019, 19 people were convicted of conspiracy to defraud and nine were sent to they served their time, evidence emerged that central bankers and government officials across the world, including a top adviser at Downing Street at the time, had pressured banks such as theirs to engage in very similar conduct to what they were jailed for - but on a much greater scale. No central banker or government official was after they were released after serving their full jail terms, a US appeal court decided such conduct was not a crime after all; nor even against any US Department of Justice revoked the charges against Tom Hayes, and the US courts then threw out all similar in the UK, they remained convicted criminals. What did Supreme Court rule? After a 10-year legal battle, the Supreme Court ruled that the trials of Mr Hayes and Mr Palombo were unfair and overturned their the UK, the traders' cases had been blocked from reaching the Supreme Court by the Court of Appeal five times between 2015 and the Supreme Court exonerated Mr Hayes and Mr Palombo, ruling that directions given to the jury at the end of Mr Hayes and Mr Palombo's trials were incorrect, meaning their convictions were found to be Serious Fraud Office, which had brought the case against the traders, said it would not be in the public interest to seek a retrial. What happens next? Mr Hayes told a press conference he might be able to recoup the money confiscated from him. He said he will take advice over claiming compensation."I've lived for the last ten years on a 24-hour basis, because I've been unable to plan any aspect of my life," he said. He was prosecuted, then jailed, then on licence."Now suddenly the vista of freedom and choice and what I might do has been opened up to me."Conservative MP David Davies said the "scape-goating exercise happened as a result of collusion between the banks and government agencies... and we're not done with that - we'll come back to that in Parliament in the autumn."Mr Hayes' solicitor, Karen Todner, called for a full public inquiry into the convictions, and for the justice system to be reformed."Tom has missed out on formative years with his son, time with his family, and the loss of his career and his home," she said. "Time he will never get back".She said the charge against Mr Hayes had been "hopelessly vague", the case had taken too long to come to said the Serious Fraud Office, alongside bodies such as the Post Office and the RSPCA, should not be able to bring criminal prosecutions, because the "dual role of investigator and prosecutor creates a substantial conflict of interest, which creates miscarriages of justice".Ben Rose, the solicitor for Carlo Palombo, said other traders may now be able to "right the wrong done to them".
