banksters really cleaning up
Big time gains behind all this. But China knows how to deal!
The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating whether Barclays (NYSE:BCS) and UBS (NYSE:OUBS) sold structured products without disclosing the profit they were making from currency trades used to generate the products' returns, FT reports. Five major banks, including UBS, were fined $3.4B in November to settle forex allegations, although the DOJ was not one of the agencies involved in the deal. Barclays also did not take part in the earlier settlement.
Meanwhile, HSBC has admitted to the failings of its Swiss subsidiary, which helped customers dodge taxes and conceal millions of dollars of assets. HSBC (NYSE:HSBC) said that its Swiss arm had not been fully integrated into the bank after its purchase in 1999, allowing "significantly lower" standards of compliance and due diligence to persist.
HSBC's admission that its Swiss-based private bank may have held accounts for tax-dodging clients, could prove highly damaging for the bank.
Secret files leaked to several news organisation link some of the clients to arms trafficking and blood diamonds, while others are closely connected to Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad and Tunisia's ousted president Ben Ali. The account holders also include former and current politicians from across the globe.
HSBC signed a five-year deferred prosecution agreement with US authorities in December 2012 after admitting that it processed drug trafficking proceeds through Mexico and transmitted funds from sanctioned countries including Iran. The agreement puts it at risk of a criminal conviction and potential loss of its crucial US banking licence if it commits another crime in that period. (ICIJ, The Guardian, FT)
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Buffett under fire Analysts want Berkshire Hathaway to provide more detail in its financial disclosures. They call the scant detail in quarterly filings "poor" and "terrible". But Mr Buffett says he's never once bought something on the basis of an analyst recommendation.(FT)
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Morgan Stanley joins hedge fund retreat The New York bank is looking to sell its 19 per cent stake in the $17.5bn London-based Lansdowne Partners LLP, according to people familiar with the matter. (WSJ)
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China executes mining tycoon Liu Han, former chairman of the Hanlong Group , had been sentenced to death in May for "leading mafia-style crime and murder". State media reported that his Sichuan-based conglomerate, which was involved in mining, telecommunications and chemicals, had "tyrannised local people and seriously harmed the local economic and social order". (BBC)
It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong.
~ Thomas Sowell
AI
