Barclays Fined GBP60m for Interest Rate Fraud

Barclays Fined £60m for Interest Rate Fraud.

The FSA has yesterday fined Barclays Bank £59.5m for misconduct in connection to the London Interbank Offered Rate and the Euro Interbank Offered Rate.  This is the largest fine ever given out by the FSA.  

Barclays has also been fined £128m by the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission and £102.6m by the US Department of Justice, bringing the total fine against Barclays to £290.1m.

The FSA say that breaches involved a number of employees and occurred over a number of years the penalty then being Barclays fined a record level.

Ashley Clark's thoughts:

Using the Barclays £59million fine to go back into the FSA coffers to reduce regulatory fees of other banks is not right.  Likewise, I disagree with government planning to keep the money themselves.  

100% of all regulatory fines should be invested in the costs of running the parts that sort out the problems i.e.  the Financial Ombudsman Services (FOS) and the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS).  

The government should not claim it is they that pay for the running, up keep and compensation funds.  It is the good firms of the industry like mine that pick up the bill.  For too long long, the good guys in finance pay levies to the FSCS and the FOS to pay for the bad guys.  Why not use the fines of the bad firms to pay for the running of the services that help the consumer.  I am pleased that FSA have fined Barclays.