Repercussions

In 2012, the cover on this scandal was pulled and everyone was left exposed and guilty. All said and told, global banks paid $9 billion in fines after persecutors from the US and Europe led a thorough investigations over a 3-5 year period exposing the wrong doings. In the end, and through a long tedious process, regulatory commissions from the US, the UK and the EU(including many specific countries in it) all prosecuted the banks for violations of their own financial laws. UBS, RBS, Barclays, and Deutsche bank all settled with agencies paying hundreds of millions, even billions, in fines for rates rigging. In 2015, in the mitz of all these settlements after years of legal battle, banks such as Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase, Barclays, Royal Bank of Scotland, and UBS were accused and pleaded guilty to manipulating foreign exchange markets during the same period. Better known as Forex, these banks paid over 5 billion to the US justice department and other regulators for manipulating currency values for both proprietary and hedging purposes.

            Regarding blog 2, and the implications and repercussions to the traders who engaged in this scam, their justice came full swing as well. Not only were the banks forced to pay enormous fines for the behavior of various traders and portfolio managers, still claiming they were blind to it, the traders themselves were cherry picked for punishment. In the end, over 100 traders and brokers had been fired or suspended, and 21 arrested. Thomas Hayes was sentenced to 14 years in prison on counts of leading a conspiracy by recruiting traders and brokers from other banks to manipulate Libor.  The US DOJ charged a total of 16 bankers involved in the scandal with two from Rabobank getting sentenced to 1-2 years- almost all pleaded guilty but many settled without jail time. 2015, when many of the investigations finally concluded in settlements and sentencing, massive shakeups occurred throughout the financial world, although in some cases, investigations from the scandal are ongoing. CEO’s were forced to step down, regulation increased in drastic and creative ways, and a restructuring of how banks are monitored is of top priority from financial law enforcement groups.