Thread: US regulator sues 16 banks for alleged Libor rigging

14 March 2014 Last updated at 17:19 ET

US regulator sues 16 banks for alleged Libor rigging

Some of the world's biggest banks have been accused of colluding to fix Libor

A US regulator has sued 16 banks for allegedly manipulating the London interbank offered rate (Libor).


The Libor rate is used to set trillions of dollars of financial contracts, including mortgages and financial transactions around the world.

The regulator said the manipulation caused substantial losses to 38 US banks which were shut down during and after the 2008 financial crisis.

The sued banks include Barclays, HSBC, Citigroup and Royal Bank of Scotland.

The British Bankers' Association (BBA) has also been sued by the regulator - the US Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).

"BBA participated in the alleged scheme to protect the revenue stream it generated from selling Libor licenses and to appease the Panel Bank Defendants that were members of the BBA," it was quoted as saying by the AFP news agency.

The FDIC alleged that the banks mentioned in its lawsuit rigged the rate from August 2007 to at least mid-2011.

Other banks named in the lawsuit include Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Deutsche Bank, Lloyds Bank, Credit Suisse, UBS, and Rabobank.

Growing pressure

London Inter Bank Offered Rate. The rate at which banks in London lend money to each other for the short-term in a particular currency. A new Libor rate is calculated every morning by financial data firm Thomson Reuters based on interest rates provided by members of the British Bankers Association.

Glossary in full
Libor is the average rate at which banks lend money to one another and is decided on a daily basis.

Most of the world's biggest banks contribute estimates to form the Libor.

But there have been allegations that some have looked to profit from it by understating or overstating their submissions.

Over the past two years, regulators across the globe have been investigating the manipulation of the rate and there have been $3.7bn (£2.26bn) in fines to date.

A string of international banks and brokers, including Barclays and the Royal Bank of Scotland, have faced both criminal and civil penalties for their involvement in the scandal.

Some banks have also been found to have understated their submissions in the period during and after the financial crisis.

They did so in order to avoid the perception that they were having to borrow at higher interest rates than their peers and might therefore be in financial difficulty.

http://www.bbc.com/news/business-26584942

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1. BBC News FDIC Sues 16 Big Banks For Rigging LIBOR Rates Huffington Post-Mar 14, 2014 The lawsuit, filed in the federal district court in New York, was the latest to accuse financial institutions of conspiring to manipulate Libor, or the ... FDIC sues banks over alleged Libor rigging Los Angeles Times-Mar 14, 2014 US regulator sues 15 banks, including HSBC, for rigging Libor ... South China Morning Post-2 hours ago US regulator sues 16 banks for alleged Libor rigging BBC News-Mar 14, 2014 FDIC sues world's top 16 banks over Libor rigging Gulf Times-6 hours ago BofA, Citigroup, Credit Suisse Sued by FDIC Over Libor Rigging In-Depth-Businessweek-Mar 14, 2014 Gulf Times Financial Post The Globe and Mail Aljazeera.com International Business Times UK Yahoo!7 News Explore in depth (209 more articles)

2. US FDIC sues 16 banks for rigging Libor Reuters-Mar 14, 2014 The lawsuit, filed in the federal district court in New York, was the latest to accuse financial institutions of conspiring to manipulate Libor, or the ...

3. FDIC Sues Banks Over Rate Rigging Fox Business-Mar 14, 2014 The rate in question is called the London Interbank Offered Rate, or LIBOR for short.LIBOR underpins some $350 trillion in derivatives and $10 ...

4. FDIC sues 16 big banks for rigging LIBOR rate Columbus Dispatch-14 hours ago The banks rigged the London interbank offered rate, or LIBOR, from August 2007 to at least mid-2011, the FDIC alleges. The LIBOR affects ...

5. RBS and Lloyds sued in New York over Libor-rigging Herald Scotland-17 hours ago ... in New York in the latest fall-out from the Libor rate-rigging scandal. ... keeping theLondon Interbank Offered Rate (Libor) deliberately low to ...

6. FDIC sues Royal Bank, others for LIBOR rigging CBC.ca-Mar 14, 2014 Canada's largest bank has been named in a lawsuit from a top U.S. banking regulator that accuses them and more than a dozen of the world's ...

7. US sues 16 banks for rigging Libor rate Aljazeera.com-18 hours ago The banks rigged the London interbank offered rate, or Libor, from August ... to settle US and European regulators' charges of rigging theLibor.

8. Ex-Barclays bankers charged with Libor rigging CNN-Feb 18, 2014 Prosecutors have charged three former Barclays bankers in connection with the rigging of global interest rates. The U.K.'s Serious Fraud Office, ... Three former Barclays employees face SFO charges over Libor Highly Cited-Financial Times-Feb 17, 2014Explore in depth (212 more articles)

9. Bank of England calls in leading QC to investigate forex-rigging claims The Guardian-by Jill Treanor-Mar 14, 2014 The Bank's governor, Mark Carney, told MPs this week that the scandal had the potential to be bigger than the rigging of Libor, which has ...

10. RBS sued in Libor rigging International Business Times UK-14 hours ago The FDIC alleges that the BBA, a trade group representing the interests of more than 240 member banks, supported rigging of the Libor rate to ...

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