It's been widely reported that the above was said by one of the foreign exchange traders whose behaviour has led to the imposition of fines exceeding £3 billion on the banks they worked for.
Those banks are worth naming. They areBarclays, RBS, Citigroup, JP Morgan and Bank of America. UBS took part in the activity but received favourable treating for being the first to report it.
There are three obvious observations to make.
The first is that this market rigging took place in 2011 and 12. The idea that the crash brought an end to corrupt practices is a total myth. Corruption is alive and well and living in the City of London.
Second, as the position so those who took part suggests, this was not corruption by a few lowly traders. As the FT notes:
Membership of the chatroom used by the “Cartel” was by invitation only. The FT has previously named the members of the “Cartel” as Rohan Ramchandani, Citi's European head of spot trading, and Richard Usher, who moved from RBS to become JPMorgan's chief currency dealer in London.
These were people at the top of trading. It's fair to call this systemic in that case.
Third, let's not for a moment think that this is an isolated issue that is the sole preserve of banks. "If you ain't cheating, you ain't trying" is a commonplace attitude towards tax. I have looked at a new, industrial scale, tax abuse scheme recently that should, I hope, receive publicity soon. What it shows is something very simple, which is that tax cheating was being made a core part of the business strategy of those who were taking part. I'd like to say I was shocked by that, but I'm not entirely. Cheating is endemic in some businesses.
And what I stress is that this is why the tax justice agenda is just about the most pro-business lobby there is in the UK. We are asking for an end to cheating. We want the creation of a level playing field on which all businesses can compete fairly. We want honesty to be a key part of the ethics of business once more.
Candidly, is that too much to ask?
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And Labour was accused of being anti-business for wishing to address this. Even by Alan Sugar, whonI had thought better than that, and bleating Labour leadership contenders, such as Yvette “that’s a load of Balls” Cooper. Contemptible fawning of slaves and serfs on their cruel amoral masters!
Hear Hear Richard. I agree with you 100 per cent on this.
What I find incredible is that there seems no perspective whatsoever from these people about the benefits of taxation to corporate health or to economic activity that contributes to corporate profits: decent infrastructure; decent income levels = money to spend on their products/services; costs of living covered so that disposable income can be spent elsewhere – if we had to pay for our NHS use at the point of use at over-inflated private sector prices, how much money would be diverted away from the rest of the economy – holidays, shopping etc., because of that?
They and their practices are totally decoupled from reality.
Agreed
As I say, tax justice is totally pro-business
Perhaps the most pro-business campaign there is
Quite. Interesting that Justin King, then MD of Sainsbury, complained of Amazon’s tax arrangements as compromising their own (ie Sainsbury’s) competitive ability. It was not given the publicity that it should have been…
Hello Richard,
City of London, the city of corruption along with the governments of what ever persuasion and justice system. Criminal acts were perpetuated, yet nothing is done about it.
Tell me this, a chap with a mental condition was given a 6 month jail sentence for stealing 15 chocolate bars from a super market, yet banksters go free with a big bonus paid out to them. Something wrong with our society me thinks, these are acts expected in a third world country !