Article: Nine banks to pay $2 billion to US investors in rate-rigging case

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Nine banks to pay $2 billion to US investors in rate-rigging case

Pinsent Masons, 18 August 2015

Nine of the world’s largest banks have agreed to pay a total of $2 billion in compensation to investors in the US over the manipulation of exchange rates, and to cooperate in litigation against 12 other defendants.

Law firm Hausfeld announced that settlements have been reached with Bank of America, Barclays, BNP Paribas, Citi, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, JPMorgan, RBS, and UBS on behalf of investors.

The banks will now work with the investors in continuing litigation against Credit Suisse Group, Credit Suisse, Credit Suisse Securities, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Bank Securities, Morgan Stanley, Morgan Stanley & Co, Morgan Stanley & Co. International, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi., RBC Capital Markets, Société Générale and Standard Chartered. Several of these banks were added to the action last month based on facts found during the investigation, Hausfeld said.

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Article: Barclays, RBS and others settle U$2bn currency-rigging lawsuits

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Barclays, RBS and others settle U$2bn currency-rigging lawsuits

Jonathan Jones, 14 August 2015

HSBC (LON:HSBA), Barclays (LON:BARC), Royal Bank of Scotland (LON:RBS) and two other banks settled on yet more payouts for currency-rigging.

The banks settled with US investors, agreeing to a payout which took the overall total paid to the investors to US$2bn (£1.28bn) from nine banks.

US heavyweight Goldman Sachs and BNP Paribas also settled.

It’s another round of payouts after six banks, including Barclays and RBS were, in May, ordered to pay US$6bn (£3.84bn) by UK and US authorities.

At the time, Barclays was hit with the biggest bank fine in British history.

American investors claimed the banks joined together to manipulate the US$5.3trn a day foreign exchange market.

Legal firm Hausfeld, which represented the investors, said that the agreements were preliminary and subject to approval by US District Judge Lorna Schofield.

As yet, there has been no information on how the sum would be divided between the banks if passed.

“In addition to the billions of dollars in compensation, these settling banks have agreed to cooperate with investors in their continuing litigation” against other institutions, Hausfeld said.

The banks yet to settle are Standard Chartered (LON:STAN), Societe Generale, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, RBC Capital Markets, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse and Morgan Stanley.

The US$2bn includes earlier settlements of US$800mln, with JPMorgan, Bank of America, UBS and Citigroup.

“While the recoveries here are tremendous, they are just the beginning,” said Hausfeld chairman Michael Hausfeld.

“Investors around the world should take note of the significant recoveries secured in the United States and recognize that these settlements cover a fraction of the world’s largest financial market,” he said.

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Article: RBS, Barclays, HSBC … it’s time to get out of coal!

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RBS, Barclays, HSBC … it’s time to get out of coal!

Greig Aitken BankTrack, 04 August 2015

In advance of the UN climate summit in Paris, campaign groups are urging the banking sector to take one concrete step towards combatting the climate crisis, and quit financing coal.

It is hard to think of a UK business sector in more dire need of an image boost than the banking sector. The UK’s three biggest banks – Royal Bank of Scotland, Barclays and HSBC – appear stuck on a never-ending, Escher-esque scandal treadmill of their own making.

Round and round they go, ripping off small businesses (RBS), enabling Latin American drug cartels to launder billions and orchestrating tax evasion in Switzerland (HSBC), and blatantly mis-selling payment protection insurance to vulnerable customers (Barclays).

This behaviour is of course accompanied by obscene bonuses that the same banks have still seen fit to churn out to staff as regularly as clockwork every year since the 2008 crash.

Reporting from outside RBS’s City of London headquarters in November last year as a further multi-bank scandal concerning illegal foreign exchange rate manipulation was breaking, the Economics Editor of Channel 4 News, Paul Mason, visibly fighting back the expletives, let rip on air:

“I’m just sick of it, after six years why do we have to keep coming to do it?”

He was referring to yet more time spent covering yet more market manipulation, with little in the way of effective sanctions being dished out to prevent it, Mason’s angst summed up the UK public’s views about the banks.

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Article: Valuing Tucows Inc. (TCX) From A Bearish Perspective

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Valuing Tucows Inc. (TCX) From A Bearish Perspective

Sonya Colberg, 03 August 2015

You’ve almost gotta love Tucows Inc. (USA) (NASDAQ:TCX) for its humor, as demonstrated by the company reportedly taking a real cow to a conference, plus its depiction of two cows in its logo. But the negatives inherent in Tucows’ business plan utterly outweigh its funny personality. Continue reading “Article: Valuing Tucows Inc. (TCX) From A Bearish Perspective”

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