****bag Millionaires

[hibiedude]

FOUR millionaires blamed over Britain’s banking meltdown were forced to make grovelling apologies yesterday.
Former RBS bosses Sir Fred Goodwin and Sir Tom McKillop — and their HBOS counterparts — admitted they had misjudged the economic crisis.

They spoke just before a further 2,300 RBS jobs were axed in the growing financial turmoil.

http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scot...cle2225931.ece

[Betty Boop]

FOUR millionaires blamed over Britain’s banking meltdown were forced to make grovelling apologies yesterday.
Former RBS bosses Sir Fred Goodwin and Sir Tom McKillop — and their HBOS counterparts — admitted they had misjudged the economic crisis.

They spoke just before a further 2,300 RBS jobs were axed in the growing financial turmoil.

http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scot...cle2225931.ece

Andy Hornby previously of HBOS is now a "consultant" for Lloyds on a salary of £60,000 a month. :bitchy:

[Andy74]

FOUR millionaires blamed over Britain’s banking meltdown were forced to make grovelling apologies yesterday.
Former RBS bosses Sir Fred Goodwin and Sir Tom McKillop — and their HBOS counterparts — admitted they had misjudged the economic crisis.

They spoke just before a further 2,300 RBS jobs were axed in the growing financial turmoil.

http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scot...cle2225931.ece

For all thje people pointing the figure - this was a gloabl crisis that no-one manged to spot in terms of scale and depth.

It's a bit easy jumping on the bandwagon and laying the balme but doe peop, know what happened and what part these guys played?

I know a fair bit about this and about two of the guys in particular and the jobs they have done and 99% of what is written by the press and also spouted by MPs is total nonsense. Scapegoating of the highest order.

Yes, some nknew there were som problems ahead, so did the banks, they were prepared for the worst that they expected, they did not, and nobody knew how bad things were going to get.

[hibsbollah]

If you think about it, having to say 'im very sorry' to a bunch of backbench MPs isn't exactly tough justice. When the Japanese bubble burst in the 90s, the equivalent to these RBS and HBOS clowns in Tokyo did the honourable thing and jumped out of the 25th Floor.

[JoeT]

Before the Govt bailouts both companies put our share issues at prices way over their current worth. Is this just stupidity/negligence on their part they did not see how big the whole they were in or should they just be thrown in jail for fraud?

[lapsedhibee]

For all thje people pointing the figure - this was a gloabl crisis that no-one manged to spot in terms of scale and depth.

It's a bit easy jumping on the bandwagon and laying the balme but doe peop, know what happened and what part these guys played?

I know a fair bit about this and about two of the guys in particular and the jobs they have done and 99% of what is written by the press and also spouted by MPs is total nonsense. Scapegoating of the highest order.

Yes, some nknew there were som problems ahead, so did the banks, they were prepared for the worst that they expected, they did not, and nobody knew how bad things were going to get.

Disagree. The defence of "nobody else could foresee it was going to get so bad either" doesn't wash at all. It was The Scotch Four's job to take care of money. They were either grossly reckless themselves, or oversaw gross recklessness in their companies. The fact that other people in other countries were equally reckless has no bearing whatsoever on their culpability. In a few years they have destroyed hundreds of years of Scottish banking reputation, which is highly unlikely to be regained in our lifetimes. Public humiliation is the very, very least they deserve, and how a couple of them still have titles at this stage is beyond me.

[Andy74]

Disagree. The defence of "nobody else could foresee it was going to get so bad either" doesn't wash at all. It was The Scotch Four's job to take care of money. They were either grossly reckless themselves, or oversaw gross recklessness in their companies. The fact that other people in other countries were equally reckless has no bearing whatsoever on their culpability. In a few years they have destroyed hundreds of years of Scottish banking reputation, which is highly unlikely to be regained in our lifetimes. Public humiliation is the very, very least they deserve, and how a couple of them still have titles at this stage is beyond me.

Rather overly simplistic. What is grossly reckless in dealing in the same assets and securities that were being dealt the whole world over? Assets that were confirmed by ratings agencies as AAA. There was in incredible amount of governanace and risk testing applied in all of the fianancial institutions over the world.

To suppose that four guys in Edinburgh were going to be able to see the scale of what was happening ahead of everyone else is a nice thought but unrealsitic.

I sat through the daily news that was coming into the execs for the last two years of this and beleive me, althoug people thought things were going to be bad, and testing was done on that level, nothing at all prepared anyone for what ahppened when Lehamns went and the speed that it went.

I don't think people will be able to apprecaite how things changed and why, but they did, very seriosuly and very quickly.

Yes, before that people were saying there was a credit crunch and people seen the recession, but what happened in banking in October was not predicted by anyone, even if they say it was.

The guys have accepted that they were in ahcarge and ultimatley responsible, good on them, but they were only doing what they thought was best at the time.

For the last ten years or more institutional investors have been urging banks to borrow more and increase risk and return, if they hadn't, if they had slowed down, investors would have sold out, Sir Fred and co would have been laughed out of town.

Yes, thjey were in charge, yes, they are ultimatley responsible for what happens on their watch in their banks but with all that was known or could be predicted at the time let's not swallow the media or political spin that the global crisis had much to do with Sir Fred or Andy Hornby.

[Andy74]

Before the Govt bailouts both companies put our share issues at prices way over their current worth. Is this just stupidity/negligence on their part they did not see how big the whole they were in or should they just be thrown in jail for fraud?

The issues clearly illustrate the very point - they did not know what was to come - advisers, regulators, governmets and investors were all willing to back the actions taken at the time.

The fact that on each occassion all directors perosnally subscribed to the maximum and have since lost the bulk of their money shows that they were genuine attempts to solve the situations, there was nothing fraudulent about it.

[hibsbollah]

The issues clearly illustrate the very point - they did not know what was to come - advisers, regulators, governmets and investors were all willing to back the actions taken at the time.

The fact that on each occassion all directors perosnally subscribed to the maximum and have since lost the bulk of their money shows that they were genuine attempts to solve the situations, there was nothing fraudulent about it.

It could also show they were recklessly following a risky strategy, which would constitute fraud regardless of whether there was any actual intention involved. Look at this guy's evidence... http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7882124.stm
...If that is proven to be true, HBOS/RBS were committed to doing something that they knew was likely to lead to disaster, and could be charged with a criminal offence. The £10billion purchase of that Dutch bank that was full of toxic debt, for example, was after the crdeit crunch had already happened. Defies any kind of logic:rolleyes:

[Andy74]

It could also show they were recklessly following a risky strategy, which would constitute fraud regardless of whether there was any actual intention involved. Look at this guy's evidence... http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7882124.stm
...If that is proven to be true, HBOS/RBS were committed to doing something that they knew was likely to lead to disaster, and could be charged with a criminal offence. The £10billion purchase of that Dutch bank that was full of toxic debt, for example, was after the crdeit crunch had already happened. Defies any kind of logic:rolleyes:

Following a risky strategy is what business is about, investors had been encouraging their banks to take more risks to generate more returns. you do all sorts of stress testing though but what happened was much, much worse than could ever have been anticipated with any of thes tests.

ABN AMRO was completed after the credit crunch had started but what i'm trying to get through to you is that RBS knew that, they had looked at the risks of the worst they thought the credit crunch could throw at it and at the time it still looked like a good deal.

You simply cannot take what is known about what happened now and transalte it to the decision making process at the time.

As i keep saying people said things weee going to be bad, everyoe knew that, but the scale of what happened was not forseeable.

Sir Tom confirmed the obvious that had the board known what they know now they would not have completed the deal.

I can't comment on the HBOS story but you tend to aklways get somsone saying yes, I tried to tell them. You do have to look at the balance of what you know though and i can see why his views may have been not taken on board.

All the risks taken can be justitifed on the evidence known at the time, as I said above, it was encouraged by all. It's commerical decision making though, not fraud, and the execs all threw their own money away at the same time.

[Phil D. Rolls]

The thing that summed up the whole sorry mess, was that none of those in front of the select committee had any formal banking qualification. What were the regulators thinking, er.....

[hibsbollah]

Following a risky strategy is what business is about, investors had been encouraging their banks to take more risks to generate more returns. you do all sorts of stress testing though but what happened was much, much worse than could ever have been anticipated with any of thes tests.

ABN AMRO was completed after the credit crunch had started but what i'm trying to get through to you is that RBS knew that, they had looked at the risks of the worst they thought the credit crunch could throw at it and at the time it still looked like a good deal.

You simply cannot take what is known about what happened now and transalte it to the decision making process at the time.

As i keep saying people said things weee going to be bad, everyoe knew that, but the scale of what happened was not forseeable.

Sir Tom confirmed the obvious that had the board known what they know now they would not have completed the deal.

I can't comment on the HBOS story but you tend to aklways get somsone saying yes, I tried to tell them. You do have to look at the balance of what you know though and i can see why his views may have been not taken on board.

All the risks taken can be justitifed on the evidence known at the time, as I said above, it was encouraged by all. It's commerical decision making though, not fraud, and the execs all threw their own money away at the same time.

You're just wrong there. Vince Cable, Lib Dem Treasury Spokesman, the only front bench politician who is actually a trained economist as well, predicted the credit crunch in all its severity months before it happened. Paul Moore told the HBOS CEO what was going to happen and was sacked for it.

ABM AMRO would only have looked a good deal to someone who had lost all sense of what risk management was. They've admitted themselves that the culture of paying big bonuses in The City encouraged risk taking beyond any reasonable sense.

You seem very keen to defend the people involved but you haven't given any evidence as to why:confused:
.

[Betty Boop]

You're just wrong there. Vince Cable, Lib Dem Treasury Spokesman, the only front bench politician who is actually a trained economist as well, predicted the credit crunch in all its severity months before it happened. Paul Moore told the HBOS CEO what was going to happen and was sacked for it.

ABM AMRO would only have looked a good deal to someone who had lost all sense of what risk management was. They've admitted themselves that the culture of paying big bonuses in The City encouraged risk taking beyond any reasonable sense.

You seem very keen to defend the people involved but you haven't given any evidence as to why:confused:. Maybe he is a banker :greengrin

[ancienthibby]

Following a risky strategy is what business is about, investors had been encouraging their banks to take more risks to generate more returns. you do all sorts of stress testing though but what happened was much, much worse than could ever have been anticipated with any of thes tests.

ABN AMRO was completed after the credit crunch had started but what i'm trying to get through to you is that RBS knew that, they had looked at the risks of the worst they thought the credit crunch could throw at it and at the time it still looked like a good deal.

You simply cannot take what is known about what happened now and transalte it to the decision making process at the time.

As i keep saying people said things weee going to be bad, everyoe knew that, but the scale of what happened was not forseeable.

Sir Tom confirmed the obvious that had the board known what they know now they would not have completed the deal.

I can't comment on the HBOS story but you tend to aklways get somsone saying yes, I tried to tell them. You do have to look at the balance of what you know though and i can see why his views may have been not taken on board.

All the risks taken can be justitifed on the evidence known at the time, as I said above, it was encouraged by all. It's commerical decision making though, not fraud, and the execs all threw their own money away at the same time.

I think your whole post is open to debate but for this riposte, let me concentrate on the highlighted quote. There is a huge amount of contrarian evidence for this, in that just about every financial commentator at that time was urging caution to 'FreddieShreddie' - and he ignored the lot!! You really need to ask very serious questions about a deal that's done in one year at some £50 billion, only one year later to require a write-down in good will of £20 billion!!??

Beyond that, you really should not try and hide behind 'this was a global crisis' shield!!

For it was not the cause of the demise of HBoS and RBS!

What was 'local' was that the Anglo-American banking system threw risk procedures out of the window and took on unmeasured risk - as a result of which Japanese, Australian, Canadian and other European banks found that their deposits with the defauling banks could not be repaid. So they got sucked in and ended defaulting themselves!!


To defend the executives is so morally wrong - in the case of Scottish banks you will find thousands and thousands of snall shareholders who depended on their 'divi' from their bank shares to keep them solvent!!

And meanwhile, FreddieShreddie, Andy Hornby et al still live in their mansions in the country and proffer utterly meaningless 'apologies'!!

[johnbc70]

I think the 4 have to accept the blame as they were in charge and ultimately should of known what was going on in their business. The collapse of Lehmans was the catalyst but sill someone has to take the blame and it needs to be the man at the top.

However I think the MPs need to have a look at themselves - some stats on our MPs.

Of The 635 current members of the House of Commons;

29 have been accused of spouse abuse

7 have been arrested for fraud

9 have been accused of writing bad cheques

17 have directly or indirectly bankrupted at least 2 businesses

3 have done time for assault

71 cannot get a credit card due to bad credit

14 have been arrested on drug-related charges

8 have been arrested for shoplifting

21 are currently defendants in lawsuits

84 have been arrested for drink driving in the last year"

Also I never saw them complaining when the likes of HBOS and RBS were paying billions of pounds in tax each year. I think RBS is by far the biggest tax payer in the UK for the last 10 years.

[Woody1985]

I think the 4 have to accept the blame as they were in charge and ultimately should of known what was going on in their business. The collapse of Lehmans was the catalyst but sill someone has to take the blame and it needs to be the man at the top.

However I think the MPs need to have a look at themselves - some stats on our MPs.

Of The 635 current members of the House of Commons;

29 have been accused of spouse abuse

7 have been arrested for fraud

9 have been accused of writing bad cheques

17 have directly or indirectly bankrupted at least 2 businesses

3 have done time for assault

71 cannot get a credit card due to bad credit

14 have been arrested on drug-related charges

8 have been arrested for shoplifting

21 are currently defendants in lawsuits

84 have been arrested for drink driving in the last year"

Also I never saw them complaining when the likes of HBOS and RBS were paying billions of pounds in tax each year. I think RBS is by far the biggest tax payer in the UK for the last 10 years.

Those stats are probably about average for the population. :faf:

Is it possible to do an annonymous poll? ie even the admins couldn't see the results? It would be quite interesting to get a poll of the number of criminal offences people on Hibs.net have, their crime(s). etc then we can compare it to the MPs stats.

[kollontai]

Lets be perfectly clear about this,this whole system is about making profit.Profit comes from the exploitation of workers who do all the work.For years the capitalists have been gambling with other peoples money and now have found that there gamble has not payed off.thousands of people are going to lose their jobs as aresult of a few greedy individuals at the top of society.What is this nonsencense about oh we didn't know it was going to happen.Marx predicted the inherant rate of profit was bound to falll within the system over 150 years ago.
These greedy bankers have been playing fast and loose with other peoples money and now we are paying the consequencies.We have been taxed up to the eyeballs to bail out a sytem so that they can go back and do exactly the same again.
Where is it going to end-the last great reccesion brought the rise of the nazis a second world war which cost 50 million lives and untold misery for millions.We are now being told that we may be going in to the worst recession ever seen.When are we going to say enough is enough.Scrap bank bonuses,renationalise all failing industries,rebuild public housing,get to hell out of Afghanistan and Iraq,scrap trident and save peoples jobs.:cool2:

[LiverpoolHibs]

Lets be perfectly clear about this,this whole system is about making profit.Profit comes from the exploitation of workers who do all the work.For years the capitalists have been gambling with other peoples money and now have found that there gamble has not payed off.thousands of people are going to lose their jobs as aresult of a few greedy individuals at the top of society.What is this nonsencense about oh we didn't know it was going to happen.Marx predicted the inherant rate of profit was bound to falll within the system over 150 years ago.
These greedy bankers have been playing fast and loose with other peoples money and now we are paying the consequencies.We have been taxed up to the eyeballs to bail out a sytem so that they can go back and do exactly the same again.
Where is it going to end-the last great reccesion brought the rise of the nazis a second world war which cost 50 million lives and untold misery for millions.We are now being told that we may be going in to the worst recession ever seen.When are we going to say enough is enough.Scrap bank bonuses,renationalise all failing industries,rebuild public housing,get to hell out of Afghanistan and Iraq,scrap trident and save peoples jobs.:cool2:

Kudos to the new member and references to mildly obscure feminist, dissident Bolsheviks!

[kollontai]

Only miedly obscure-I was going to use Clara Zetkin or Rosa Luxemburg but then I thought nah-give the punters on Hibs .net a challenge!

[hibsbollah]

Lets be perfectly clear about this,this whole system is about making profit.Profit comes from the exploitation of workers who do all the work.For years the capitalists have been gambling with other peoples money and now have found that there gamble has not payed off.thousands of people are going to lose their jobs as aresult of a few greedy individuals at the top of society.What is this nonsencense about oh we didn't know it was going to happen.Marx predicted the inherant rate of profit was bound to falll within the system over 150 years ago.
These greedy bankers have been playing fast and loose with other peoples money and now we are paying the consequencies.We have been taxed up to the eyeballs to bail out a sytem so that they can go back and do exactly the same again.
Where is it going to end-the last great reccesion brought the rise of the nazis a second world war which cost 50 million lives and untold misery for millions.We are now being told that we may be going in to the worst recession ever seen.When are we going to say enough is enough.Scrap bank bonuses,renationalise all failing industries,rebuild public housing,get to hell out of Afghanistan and Iraq,scrap trident and save peoples jobs.:cool2:

I think we have found our new hibs.net politburo chief of staff:cool2:
Marx got a lot right about economics that he isnt given credit for. Globalisation of capital was one of his predictions that has come true (although the workers paradise is still some way off, I believe:wink:)

[Betty Boop]

Lets be perfectly clear about this,this whole system is about making profit.Profit comes from the exploitation of workers who do all the work.For years the capitalists have been gambling with other peoples money and now have found that there gamble has not payed off.thousands of people are going to lose their jobs as aresult of a few greedy individuals at the top of society.What is this nonsencense about oh we didn't know it was going to happen.Marx predicted the inherant rate of profit was bound to falll within the system over 150 years ago.
These greedy bankers have been playing fast and loose with other peoples money and now we are paying the consequencies.We have been taxed up to the eyeballs to bail out a sytem so that they can go back and do exactly the same again.
Where is it going to end-the last great reccesion brought the rise of the nazis a second world war which cost 50 million lives and untold misery for millions.We are now being told that we may be going in to the worst recession ever seen.When are we going to say enough is enough.Scrap bank bonuses,renationalise all failing industries,rebuild public housing,get to hell out of Afghanistan and Iraq,scrap trident and save peoples jobs.:cool2:

:top marks

[Andy74]

You're just wrong there. Vince Cable, Lib Dem Treasury Spokesman, the only front bench politician who is actually a trained economist as well, predicted the credit crunch in all its severity months before it happened. Paul Moore told the HBOS CEO what was going to happen and was sacked for it.

ABM AMRO would only have looked a good deal to someone who had lost all sense of what risk management was. They've admitted themselves that the culture of paying big bonuses in The City encouraged risk taking beyond any reasonable sense.

You seem very keen to defend the people involved but you haven't given any evidence as to why:confused:
.


Yet again though you are falling into the trap.

Yes, people have been saying it was going to be bad, very bad, we all knew that, the guys at RBS knew it, so what the commentators and politicans are saying isn't news.

But, RBS in aprticular were prepared for the worsts of what these guys were saying, measures were taken when things got worse.

You can say all you like that people knew what was coming and it was forseeable but you are simply wrong in terms of the scale and depth of what went wrong.

The week after the Lehamn collpase was an incredible set of events where a lot of collateralised positions unwound and no-one knew the value of anyhting.

Without giving too much away i was in on all the discussions on this matter for the last two years so i know what these guys knew and what the warnings were and what they were thinking.

Trust me, when they all threw their money into the rights issues they thought things were going to be fine, it turend out to be wrong but to allege that there was any fraud or recklesness beyone what was reasonable in all the circumstances is wrong.

On the institutional investors point tbhese guys have been pushing banks for returns and taking more and more risk, that's a fact. Same as the public were happy to look for better and better credit deals. The retails side of it though and losses there are insignificant to the losses in the investment banks.

It's all very well for people to say they called this because they thought it was going to be very bad, even they didn't know it was going to be this bad for the banks, I can guarantee you that.

[hibsbollah]

Yet again though you are falling into the trap.

Yes, people have been saying it was going to be bad, very bad, we all knew that, the guys at RBS knew it, so what the commentators and politicans are saying isn't news.

But, RBS in aprticular were prepared for the worsts of what these guys were saying, measures were taken when things got worse.

You can say all you like that people knew what was coming and it was foresseable but you are simply wrong in terms of the scale and epth of what went wrong.

The week after the Lehamn collpase was an incredible set of events where a lot of collarealised positions unwound and no-one knew the value of anyhting.

Without giving too much away i was in on all the discussions on this matter for the last two years so i know what these guys knew and what the warnings were and what they were thinking.

Trust me, when they all threw their money into the rights issues they thought things were going to be fine, it turend out to be wrong but to allege that there was any fraud or recklesness beyone what was reasonable in all the circumstances is wrong.

On the institutional investors point tbhese guys have been pushing banks for returns and taking more and more risk, that's a fact. Same as the public were happy to look for better and better credit deals. The retails side of it though and losses there are insignificant to the losses in the investment banks.

It's all very well for people to say they called this because they thought it was going to be very bad, even they didn't know it was going to be this bad for the banks, I can guarantee you that.

Sorry, but you're just saying the same things again and again without any evidence to back you up at all. Unless you are going to talk in specific terms about anything, or answer any of the conflicting evidence (heres another bombshell this morning from the FSA(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7885059.stm), all the facts point in the opposite direction to what you're saying.

[Andy74]

Sorry, but you're just saying the same things again and again without any evidence to back you up at all. Unless you are going to talk in specific terms about anything, or answer any of the conflicting evidence (heres another bombshell this morning from the FSA(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7885059.stm), all the facts point in the opposite direction to what you're saying.

I'm hardly going to give you specific information.

The evidence suggests people made warning, of course they did, but the warnings that you keep hearing about did not go anywhere near the crisis point reached during October.

Of course I'm saying the same thing over again, them's the facts.

The fact that all the amjor banks had to raise capital in one way or another and that at the time all the advisers, regulators, boards, etc all beleived that as things stood and as far as they could see forward, that the measures were going to be sufficient.

As I've said, I was actually in on all this, those making the comments from the outside were not. Politicans, media, included.

The commercial decisions were proved to be wrong, of course they were, but only with the benefit of hindsight.

Ill say it one more time, warnings were nade, it was all taken in, but none, not one, of the warning ssuggested what actually took place in October and no amount of people saying now that they knew in advance will change the fact that they didn't.

The HBOS thing you have linked to is a bit different, they had a strategy to rely completely on wholseal markets which many people knew was a mistake, gain they didn't think it would ever get to the stage it did, but this is the problem, each bank had some different issues, but people are looking at this overall and making judgements on what people did and didn't know.

[hibsbollah]

I suspect i'm wasting my time here but here goes;

October has just happened. Noone can get credit anywhere. People are saying this is going to be the worst recession in 50 years. In that environment, do you think the decision by RBS Execs to spend £50 billion buying toxic debt from a Dutch bank was good business sense? If, like me, you would consider this reckless, then it doesn't matter how much money the executives lost themselves as individuals, they are culpable.

Not even the bankers involved themselves are trying to pretend that the mistakes they made were part of 'normal business risk-taking', as you are suggesting.

I don't know what 'discussions' you were involved in in your working life, but just because you work in this industry, doesnt mean you have any more knowledge as to what was going on than anyone else. (Some would say even less so:wink:)

[ancienthibby]

I suspect i'm wasting my time here but here goes;

October has just happened. Noone can get credit anywhere. People are saying this is going to be the worst recession in 50 years. In that environment, do you think the decision by RBS Execs to spend £50 billion buying toxic debt from a Dutch bank was good business sense? If, like me, you would consider this reckless, then it doesn't matter how much money the executives lost themselves as individuals, they are culpable.

Not even the bankers involved themselves are trying to pretend that the mistakes they made were part of 'normal business risk-taking', as you are suggesting.

I don't know what 'discussions' you were involved in in your working life, but just because you work in this industry, doesnt mean you have any more knowledge as to what was going on than anyone else. (Some would say even less so:wink:)

You are certainly not wasting your time Bollah, as I think we are just at the very front end of what may be years of unravelling all the chicanery that's been practised in international banks for many years!

You may have seen the story yesterday that the FSA released a statement claiming that they were sufficiently concerned about the risk management activities in HBOS as far back as 2002 that they wrote to the bank at that point. Add to that the written statement made by the 'whistleblower' (a Mr. More) to the Commons Treasury Select Committee which was published on the Beeb website for a while yesterday and then disappeared. This had the immediate effect of triggering Crosby's resignation as he knew he had been rumbled.

I suspect there are an auful lot of nervous auditors and NED's out there and I suspect there will be a number of casualties over the coming months. With respect to 'FredtheShred', his management of the RBS and, in particular, the ABN takeover is on a far grander scale than that which put Nick Leeson behind bars!

Watch this space, I say.

[JimBHibees]

It seems pretty clear that the banks aided by government policy created a bubble that was destined to burst. People getting mortgages 6 x their wages is totally unsustainable, allied to the previously never ending opportunities to get more credit. Mr Prudence has been shown to be anything but and why we even bother with the FSA I dont know as they obviously have and had no power whatsoever. Personally think the banks should be nationalised and forced to change, what is happening at the moment is akin to adjusting the chairs on the deck of the Titanic IMO.

Labour spin is never ending and quite how they had the gall to trawl out 2 Jags Prescott as the Account Holders champion against bank bonuses sums up their appalling arrogance and morally corrupt nature.

[RyeSloan]

Lets be perfectly clear about this,this whole system is about making profit.Profit comes from the exploitation of workers who do all the work.For years the capitalists have been gambling with other peoples money and now have found that there gamble has not payed off.thousands of people are going to lose their jobs as aresult of a few greedy individuals at the top of society.What is this nonsencense about oh we didn't know it was going to happen.Marx predicted the inherant rate of profit was bound to falll within the system over 150 years ago.
These greedy bankers have been playing fast and loose with other peoples money and now we are paying the consequencies.We have been taxed up to the eyeballs to bail out a sytem so that they can go back and do exactly the same again.
Where is it going to end-the last great reccesion brought the rise of the nazis a second world war which cost 50 million lives and untold misery for millions.We are now being told that we may be going in to the worst recession ever seen.When are we going to say enough is enough.Scrap bank bonuses,renationalise all failing industries,rebuild public housing,get to hell out of Afghanistan and Iraq,scrap trident and save peoples jobs.:cool2:

I love the profit is bad line then followed by nationalise all failing industries...why? So they can make bigger losses?

We have been taxed up to the eyeballs not to bail out a system (although future tax will need to be used for that!) but to pay for a huge expansion of the public sector under Labour...just what you are demanding more of is it not...more government owned business run under an ethos that profit is bad supported by a shrinking private sector tax payments.

As for Afghanistan, Iraq and Trident...well maybe but even Socialist or Communist countries have seemed to like their weapons and their wars :wink:

[Hibbyradge]

Kudos to the new member and references to mildly obscure feminist, dissident Bolsheviks!

Just obscure. :agree:

[matty_f]

I'm hardly going to give you specific information.

The evidence suggests people made warning, of course they did, but the warnings that you keep hearing about did not go anywhere near the crisis point reached during October.

Of course I'm saying the same thing over again, them's the facts.

The fact that all the amjor banks had to raise capital in one way or another and that at the time all the advisers, regulators, boards, etc all beleived that as things stood and as far as they could see forward, that the measures were going to be sufficient.

As I've said, I was actually in on all this, those making the comments from the outside were not. Politicans, media, included.

The commercial decisions were proved to be wrong, of course they were, but only with the benefit of hindsight.

Ill say it one more time, warnings were nade, it was all taken in, but none, not one, of the warning ssuggested what actually took place in October and no amount of people saying now that they knew in advance will change the fact that they didn't.

The HBOS thing you have linked to is a bit different, they had a strategy to rely completely on wholseal markets which many people knew was a mistake, gain they didn't think it would ever get to the stage it did, but this is the problem, each bank had some different issues, but people are looking at this overall and making judgements on what people did and didn't know.

HSBC warned of the impact of the sub-prime market in America long before it became an issue, and changed their strategy to suit.

As a result they were well placed to remain healthy throughout a period where their competitors were by and large taking a shafting.

Had other banks taken steps they could have been in a much better place now.

[Sauzee07]

The market knew at the time that RBS were making a grave error purchasing ABN AMRO. An article from the FT at the time sums it up nicely. (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4098a9ec-6fcf-11dc-b66c-0000779fd2ac,dwp_uuid=902b0cf0-f317-11db-9845-000b5df10621.html?nclick_check=1)

You may also be staggered to see the following information which was posted on 15th December by a financial commentator:

And finally........................what a difference a year can make. Just one year ago the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) paid $100bn (of which 80% was in cash) for ABN AMRO after a tiresome tussle with Barclays. Much to their unknowing good fortune Barclays lost out.

Only a year later just think what RBS could buy today with the same money:

Citibank $22.5bn,
Morgan Stanley $10.5bn,
Goldman Sachs $21.0bn,
Merrill Lynch $12.3bn,
Deutsche Bank $13.0bn and
Barclays $12.7bn,
and still have $8bn change......!!! Can it really be true that so much value has been destroyed? Well, yes!

[LiverpoolHibs]

Just obscure. :agree:

Pah! Who hasn't read The Social Basis Of The Woman Question?

:wink:

[Andy74]

The market knew at the time that RBS were making a grave error purchasing ABN AMRO. An article from the FT at the time sums it up nicely. (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4098a9ec-6fcf-11dc-b66c-0000779fd2ac,dwp_uuid=902b0cf0-f317-11db-9845-000b5df10621.html?nclick_check=1)

You may also be staggered to see the following information which was posted on 15th December by a financial commentator:

And finally........................what a difference a year can make. Just one year ago the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) paid $100bn (of which 80% was in cash) for ABN AMRO after a tiresome tussle with Barclays. Much to their unknowing good fortune Barclays lost out.

Only a year later just think what RBS could buy today with the same money:

Citibank $22.5bn,
Morgan Stanley $10.5bn,
Goldman Sachs $21.0bn,
Merrill Lynch $12.3bn,
Deutsche Bank $13.0bn and
Barclays $12.7bn,
and still have $8bn change......!!! Can it really be true that so much value has been destroyed? Well, yes!



Actually wrong, as RBS paid £10 billion, not £100 billion or 100 billion USD, that wrong email has been going around for a while.

RBS were well aware of issues like those discussed in the press at the time but the guys at RBS were closer to the figures and the realities. At the time, despite all the comment, it was still viewed as a good deal, with justification.

As I keep saying things changed and although it gives peple the opportunity to say we told you so the reason it was wrong was entirely different than the points made at the time.

[Andy74]

I suspect i'm wasting my time here but here goes;

October has just happened. Noone can get credit anywhere. People are saying this is going to be the worst recession in 50 years. In that environment, do you think the decision by RBS Execs to spend £50 billion buying toxic debt from a Dutch bank was good business sense? If, like me, you would consider this reckless, then it doesn't matter how much money the executives lost themselves as individuals, they are culpable.

Not even the bankers involved themselves are trying to pretend that the mistakes they made were part of 'normal business risk-taking', as you are suggesting.

I don't know what 'discussions' you were involved in in your working life, but just because you work in this industry, doesnt mean you have any more knowledge as to what was going on than anyone else. (Some would say even less so:wink:)

In this case the discussions I have had and the job I do are as close to this as you are going to get thanks very much so I am infinitely better placed to know the thought process at the time than the press, the public or 99.9% of the people in the bank.

So, I have lots more knowledge about his, thanks very much.

What you are saying is still wrong, they paid £10bn, not £50 for, among other things, assets that were not known to be toxic at the time. I think you are getting your info and your phrases from the press so I understand why you hold your views.

The ABN purchase was many months before October by the way.

[JimBHibees]

Actually wrong, as RBS paid £10 billion, not £100 billion or 100 billion USD, that wrong email has been going around for a while.



Almost £50bn say FT.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/742e6dba-7762-11dc-9de8-0000779fd2ac,dwp_uuid=902b0cf0-f317-11db-9845-000b5df10621.html

[Andy74]

Almost £50bn say FT.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/742e6dba-7762-11dc-9de8-0000779fd2ac,dwp_uuid=902b0cf0-f317-11db-9845-000b5df10621.html

Yes they do, but RBS' share of the consortium was about £10 billion. Trust me.

This added to some of the comment early on about oerpayment, but the figures were not accurate.

Even at the height of the intial credit cruch the savings RBS were due to make on this were £2 billion a year, so the deal would have paid itself off in synergies alone in 5 yrs.

That's before the collpase of the banking system but that's when the decision was made, long before that.

[ancienthibby]

Yes they do, but RBS' share of the consortium was about £10 billion. Trust me.

This added to some of the comment early on about oerpayment, but the figures were not accurate.

Even at the height of the intial credit cruch the savings RBS were due to make on this were £2 billion a year, so the deal would have paid itself off in synergies alone in 5 yrs.

That's before the collpase of the banking system but that's when the decision was made, long before that.

Against which they have just announced a £20 billion write-down!!

Boy, these RBS bankers are in a league of their own!!

Whatever the accuracy of the RBS/ABN data, the clear fact remains that Goodwin et al have presided over utter financial disaster for their shareholders and must be held to account.

[ancienthibby]

Yes they do, but RBS' share of the consortium was about £10 billion. Trust me.

This added to some of the comment early on about oerpayment, but the figures were not accurate.

Even at the height of the intial credit cruch the savings RBS were due to make on this were £2 billion a year, so the deal would have paid itself off in synergies alone in 5 yrs.

That's before the collpase of the banking system but that's when the decision was made, long before that.


Sorry, Andy, but your numbers are not to be trusted - so what does that do for your argument??

The RBS official prospectus says that the whole deal was valued at 71 billion Euros, of which RBS's interest was 36% amounting to 25.6 billion Euros, or in real money, at the prevailing rate of exchange of 1.43E/£ (Oct 2007) gives an RBS cost of £17.9 billion.

Quite a distance from your '£10 billion, Trust me'!!

The black hole around HBOS just deepened today.

Around RBS and its failing supporters, its neck deep in brown stuff and nowhere to go!!

[Arch Stanton]

Sorry, Andy, but your numbers are not to be trusted - so what does that do for your argument??

The RBS official prospectus says that the whole deal was valued at 71 billion Euros, of which RBS's interest was 36% amounting to 25.6 billion Euros, or in real money, at the prevailing rate of exchange of 1.43E/£ (Oct 2007) gives an RBS cost of £17.9 billion.

Quite a distance from your '£10 billion, Trust me'!!

The black hole around HBOS just deepened today.

Around RBS and its failing supporters, its neck deep in brown stuff and nowhere to go!!

Isn't the truth really that capitalism itself is headed down the drain? Aren't banks, all banks I mean and not just the ones currently making the headilines, just the first to hit the buffers? Where banks go then that is where you and I will follow I would propose.

Unless Brown and Obama call pull it from the fires that is.

Don't be too quick to gloat over the RBS losers is what I'm saying, I guess.

[Andy74]

Sorry, Andy, but your numbers are not to be trusted - so what does that do for your argument??

The RBS official prospectus says that the whole deal was valued at 71 billion Euros, of which RBS's interest was 36% amounting to 25.6 billion Euros, or in real money, at the prevailing rate of exchange of 1.43E/£ (Oct 2007) gives an RBS cost of £17.9 billion.

Quite a distance from your '£10 billion, Trust me'!!

The black hole around HBOS just deepened today.

Around RBS and its failing supporters, its neck deep in brown stuff and nowhere to go!!


Actually, my numbers are fine.

What all that above doesn't tell you, or that you didn't read in enough detail, is that RBS got about £8 billion cash in the transaction from the previously agreed sale of the US LaSalle business that RBS originally wanted in the deal but got the cash for anyway.

The net total paid therefore was about £10 billion.

As I said above, plenty of ignorance about the actual facts from people willing to have a go with the benefit of hindsight.

[ancienthibby]

Actually, my numbers are fine.

What all that above doesn't tell you, or that you didn't read in enough detail, is that RBS got about £8 billion cash in the transaction from the previously agreed sale of the US LaSalle business that RBS originally wanted in the deal but got the cash for anyway.

The net total paid therefore was about £10 billion.

As I said above, plenty of ignorance about the actual facts from people willing to have a go with the benefit of hindsight.

I have no issue with bringing LaSalle into the equation and I'll take your number as robust.

However, all that does is make the RBS position that much worse!!

What you are now saying is that RBS paid £17 billion (or so) for its share of ABN, recovered £8 billion from the sale of La Salle, for a net exposure of £9 billion, but was then forced to write-off more than twice that amount (£20 billion) for acquired toxic debt and other 'lost'loans/investments.

You could not make this up!!

[Andy74]

I have no issue with bringing LaSalle into the equation and I'll take your number as robust.

However, all that does is make the RBS position that much worse!!

What you are now saying is that RBS paid £17 billion (or so) for its share of ABN, recovered £8 billion from the sale of La Salle, for a net exposure of £9 billion, but was then forced to write-off more than twice that amount (£20 billion) for acquired toxic debt and other 'lost'loans/investments.

You could not make this up!!


Yep, that's pretty much what I'm saying!

But, it has to be taken in the right time context, it was only a number of months after the purchase completed that these assets and positions were given the value they now have.

It's more complex than just bad debt or assets, it was trading opositions held against banks that went bust due to their own assets/positions and that all only unravelled in October last year, quite some time after the assets were with RBS.

Fact is before then auditors/ratings agencies/the market were rating these assets and positions much higher and the risk radars were showing the worst case as nowhere near what the worst case became.

At the time of the purchase none of this could have been known. Sir Fred and Sir Tom have both said recently that if they knew then what they know now they wouldn't have dome the deal, but life doesn't work like that, they acted in what they thought were in the best interests at the time and criticising that with the benefit of hindsight is easy but ultimately pointless.

No one banker and no one bank is to blame here, this was a global problem.

[PeeJay]

Yep, that's pretty much what I'm saying!

But, it has to be taken in the right time context, it was only a number of months after the purchase completed that these assets and positions were given the value they now have.

It's more complex than just bad debt or assets, it was trading opositions held against banks that went bust due to their own assets/positions and that all only unravelled in October last year, quite some time after the assets were with RBS.

Fact is before then auditors/ratings agencies/the market were rating these assets and positions much higher and the risk radars were showing the worst case as nowhere near what the worst case became.

At the time of the purchase none of this could have been known. Sir Fred and Sir Tom have both said recently that if they knew then what they know now they wouldn't have dome the deal, but life doesn't work like that, they acted in what they thought were in the best interests at the time and criticising that with the benefit of hindsight is easy but ultimately pointless.

No one banker and no one bank is to blame here, this was a global problem.

1) The auditors / ratings agencies / market are surely part of the problem - they failed comprehensively to provide genuine assessments regarding risks or companies - totally incompetent!

2) A global banking / financial crisis - why do you consistently try to get the bankers off the hook? People have been criticising for years now - the only ones contending it's easy to see things with hindsight are the ones who were unable then to see it, who are still unable to see it and probably never will be able to see it - it's called living in denial, I believe!

[ancienthibby]

Yep, that's pretty much what I'm saying!

But, it has to be taken in the right time context, it was only a number of months after the purchase completed that these assets and positions were given the value they now have.

It's more complex than just bad debt or assets, it was trading opositions held against banks that went bust due to their own assets/positions and that all only unravelled in October last year, quite some time after the assets were with RBS.

Fact is before then auditors/ratings agencies/the market were rating these assets and positions much higher and the risk radars were showing the worst case as nowhere near what the worst case became.

At the time of the purchase none of this could have been known. Sir Fred and Sir Tom have both said recently that if they knew then what they know now they wouldn't have dome the deal, but life doesn't work like that, they acted in what they thought were in the best interests at the time and criticising that with the benefit of hindsight is easy but ultimately pointless.

No one banker and no one bank is to blame here, this was a global problem.

'Yep, that's pretty much what I'm saying'!

That being the case, then, two things seem clear. First, the ABN deal became a 100% write-off for RBS!! (Incredible, that!)

Second, aside from that RBS was nursing some £10-£11 billion of toxic debt from previous lending activity.

I would point out that last week the FSA issued a statement saying that they had had discussions with HBOS as far back as 2002 with respect to the state of their lending book. So it is highly likely that RBS had potentially toxic debt on its books from as far back as then as well. In the time period from 2002 to 2008 was RBS not about the fastest expanding bank in the world.

Also worth pointing out that Barclays were the original predator towards ABN and Fred got the bit between his teeth, got involved and then with the price escalating and defeat facing him, his ego would not let him withdraw. I bet there's an awful lot of quiet smiles in the Barclays board room with their (non-ABN mistake) disclosure of £5 billion in profits last week, against RBS's £20 billion write-off!!

There is no hiding place in trying to seek cover in 'this was a global problem'. It was not. It was a US/UK led banking problem with no other countries recording like the same scale of default. Any defaults in other countries were due to the established practice of leading global banks (such as RBS and Bank of America)' off-loading' part of their deals as part of the agreed relationships they have with hundreds of banks the world over. There have been the odd defaults in Spain (Santander and ABN!!), Germany and Japan, where banks there again 'picked-up' shares in US wholesale sub-prime mortgage deals.

What seems to be abundantly clear with respect to B&B, Northern (C)rock, HBOS and RBS is sheer incompetence (greed as well) in their management, a risk strategy that had got out of control, no effective corporate governance by the Boards and auditors who (let's be charitable) were not able to quantify the true state of the banks' lending positions themselves.

If Nick Leeson got hauled up before the courts for his excessive risk-taking amd the sub sequent collapse of his bank, the same should apply to Messrs Goodwin, Cameron, Whittaker, Crosby, Horner, Cumming and Applegate!! (for starters)

[Andy74]

'Yep, that's pretty much what I'm saying'!

That being the case, then, two things seem clear. First, the ABN deal became a 100% write-off for RBS!! (Incredible, that!)

Second, aside from that RBS was nursing some £10-£11 billion of toxic debt from previous lending activity.

I would point out that last week the FSA issued a statement saying that they had had discussions with HBOS as far back as 2002 with respect to the state of their lending book. So it is highly likely that RBS had potentially toxic debt on its books from as far back as then as well. In the time period from 2002 to 2008 was RBS not about the fastest expanding bank in the world.

Also worth pointing out that Barclays were the original predator towards ABN and Fred got the bit between his teeth, got involved and then with the price escalating and defeat facing him, his ego would not let him withdraw. I bet there's an awful lot of quiet smiles in the Barclays board room with their (non-ABN mistake) disclosure of £5 billion in profits last week, against RBS's £20 billion write-off!!

There is no hiding place in trying to seek cover in 'this was a global problem'. It was not. It was a US/UK led banking problem with no other countries recording like the same scale of default. Any defaults in other countries were due to the established practice of leading global banks (such as RBS and Bank of America)' off-loading' part of their deals as part of the agreed relationships they have with hundreds of banks the world over. There have been the odd defaults in Spain (Santander and ABN!!), Germany and Japan, where banks there again 'picked-up' shares in US wholesale sub-prime mortgage deals.

What seems to be abundantly clear with respect to B&B, Northern (C)rock, HBOS and RBS is sheer incompetence (greed as well) in their management, a risk strategy that had got out of control, no effective corporate governance by the Boards and auditors who (let's be charitable) were not able to quantify the true state of the banks' lending positions themselves.

If Nick Leeson got hauled up before the courts for his excessive risk-taking amd the sub sequent collapse of his bank, the same should apply to Messrs Goodwin, Cameron, Whittaker, Crosby, Horner, Cumming and Applegate!! (for starters)


RBS actually didn't have that much to write down from it's own portfolio, most is from ABN. There were two things things with the recent write offs, firstly there was a write down of goodwill associated with the ABN business and then the second part was actual asset write downs.

You mention Barclays. I wouldn't be too sure that the figures are comparable in terms of losses and write downs. There is a huge feeling that others have bitten the bullet and made write downs and that Barclays doing the same thing. We'll see in the long run. They also avoided goverment support but instead went to Middle East investors on worse terms to avoind having the same scrutiny from the goverment over what they are doing.

There'll be more to come from them.

There are certainly questions to be asked about risk management on the whole because it's been shown to not work, but people were relying on it as it stood and as such the governance can't be blamed too much, there were processes, they were followed, they were reviewed but the interaction between the risk frameworks and the ratings agencies was faulty.

Remember that these guys on boards were being assured by rating agencies that most of these assets were AAA, so there's a lot more people to blame than the boards and CEOs and it's far too simplistic to suggest it was excessive risk taking. The metrics told them that it was not excessive and in fact institional investors had been pushing banks to increase the risk in most portfolios to gain more returns.

[ancienthibby]

RBS actually didn't have that much to write down from it's own portfolio, most is from ABN. There were two things things with the recent write offs, firstly there was a write down of goodwill associated with the ABN business and then the second part was actual asset write downs.

You mention Barclays. I wouldn't be too sure that the figures are comparable in terms of losses and write downs. There is a huge feeling that others have bitten the bullet and made write downs and that Barclays doing the same thing. We'll see in the long run. They also avoided goverment support but instead went to Middle East investors on worse terms to avoind having the same scrutiny from the goverment over what they are doing.

There'll be more to come from them.

There are certainly questions to be asked about risk management on the whole because it's been shown to not work, but people were relying on it as it stood and as such the governance can't be blamed too much, there were processes, they were followed, they were reviewed but the interaction between the risk frameworks and the ratings agencies was faulty.

Remember that these guys on boards were being assured by rating agencies that most of these assets were AAA, so there's a lot more people to blame than the boards and CEOs and it's far too simplistic to suggest it was excessive risk taking. The metrics told them that it was not excessive and in fact institional investors had been pushing banks to increase the risk in most portfolios to gain more returns.

And with these words, you are now aligned with Mr. More (ex-HBOS) as a corporate whistle-blower!!

[Woody1985]

More ****bag millionaires.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7895505.stm?lss

How have Madoff and the like got away with so many billions of peoples money to 'invest'.

I wonder how many other schemes are just waiting to be found out.

[hibsdaft]

More ****bag millionaires.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7895505.stm?lss

How have Madoff and the like got away with so many billions of peoples money to 'invest'.

I wonder how many other schemes are just waiting to be found out.

the thing is, the whole system is a madoff in a way - it works nicely while things are going well and people keep their money in.

[Andy74]

[/B]And with these words, you are now aligned with Mr. More (ex-HBOS) as a corporate whistle-blower!!

Not at all, it's no secreta that institutional investors, pension funds and the like have been pretty clear over the last few years that they were keen for companies such as banks to maximise the return in their portfolios and to do tnat by increasing the risk.

The thing is the risk analysis has been shown not to have worked, but for years people have wanted more and more returns and where we are now is the ultimate by product of that.

To a lesser extent our desire to have everything now has led to pressure to have cheaper loans and for less rigourous tests to be done on thise getting them, which has led to an increase in defaults.

If banks were not acting in line with customer and market expectations they would have been heavily criticised and people and investors would have gone elsewhere. Lloyds for example used to get constant criticism for being too conservative. Still not conservative enough as it happens.

To say that some of these guys could aand should have stood out and against all this at the time when they didn't know what was to happen is a bit unrealsitic to say the least.

[ancienthibby]

Not at all, it's no secreta that institutional investors, pension funds and the like have been pretty clear over the last few years that they were keen for companies such as banks to maximise the return in their portfolios and to do tnat by increasing the risk.

The thing is the risk analysis has been shown not to have worked, but for years people have wanted more and more returns and where we are now is the ultimate by product of that.

To a lesser extent our desire to have everything now has led to pressure to have cheaper loans and for less rigourous tests to be done on thise getting them, which has led to an increase in defaults.

If banks were not acting in line with customer and market expectations they would have been heavily criticised and people and investors would have gone elsewhere. Lloyds for example used to get constant criticism for being too conservative. Still not conservative enough as it happens.

To say that some of these guys could and should have stood out and against all this at the time when they didn't know what was to happen is a bit unrealsitic to say the least.

Have to say that I find all this 'hiding behind Mammy's skirts' quite pathetic on the part of all the banks affected and their apologists!

Reminds me a lot of last year's episode with Wendy Alexander and her series of £999 donations when she effectively said 'It wisnae me, mister - two bad boys done it and run away'!!

It just never seems to be the fault of those inside RBS, HBOS and their advisers!

I am long enough in the tooth to remember some 25 years ago and a certain Middle East Bank became the centre of some concern. The Bank of England kept its name on its 'approved list' as did the credit agencies. The Credit Control Department that oversaw my team's market activities said 'no' and so we could not place short-term deposits there. At least one Scottish Council subsequently lost millions through a misquided investment!!

That scenario has been repeated recently with the astounding number of local authorities (an others) in the UK who placed deposit funds with the Icelandic bank that subsequently went bust. Obviously no lessons from the past were learnt and, as someone else once said, 'those who do not learn from the errors of the past will only repeat them'!!

And you do not need to be a genius to have spotted the signs - a remote country with 600k residents was then lending more that US banks with 1000x the capital. But, like lemmings to the cliff, the UK banks (an others) ran...

There will be a day of reckoning for these UK/US banks and... who knows.. it may well have started in Oban of all places!!

Well done Ian Hamilton and may there yet be a result that finally shames these Scottish bankers and their apologists who continue to say - 'it wisnae me, guv'!!

[Betty Boop]

RBS have today announced losses of 24 billion pounds, while Sir Fred Goodwin will draw a pension of £650,000 pounds. Something wrong here surely? :confused:

[jonty]

RBS have today announced losses of 24 billion pounds, while Sir Fred Goodwin will draw a pension of £650,000 pounds. Something wrong here surely? :confused:

:agree:
Although the govt have asked him to volunteer to reduce/stop the payments.
And he managed to get it all legally binding!

He's lost millions due to the fall in share prices but then others have also lost out and hit financial crisis - something which I doubt he'll ever experience. :grr:

On the plus side, todays announcement wasnt as bad as originally forecast in January and the share price jumped up to over 30p.

Someone has seen sense and they're splitting the investment side from the banking side.

Still lots of job losses though :bitchy:

[Betty Boop]

:agree:
Although the govt have asked him to volunteer to reduce/stop the payments.And he managed to get it all legally binding!

He's lost millions due to the fall in share prices but then others have also lost out and hit financial crisis - something which I doubt he'll ever experience. :grr:

On the plus side, todays announcement wasnt as bad as originally forecast in January and the share price jumped up to over 30p.

Someone has seen sense and they're splitting the investment side from the banking side.

Still lots of job losses though :bitchy: Do you think that will happen? £650,000 a year is outrageous, when the tax-payer is having to fork out. Unbelievable! :bitchy:

[jonty]

Do you think that will happen? £650,000 a year is outrageous, when the tax-payer is having to fork out. Unbelievable! :bitchy:
Unfortunately no. (not of his own free will, anyway).
Good luck to the govt lawyers.

Personally I'd strip him of his knighthood too.

[Betty Boop]

Unfortunately no. (not of his own free will, anyway).
Good luck to the govt lawyers.

Personally I'd strip him of his knighthood too. :agree:

[marinello59]

Unfortunately no. (not of his own free will, anyway).
Good luck to the govt lawyers.

Personally I'd strip him of his knighthood too.

I'd strip him of all his clothes, make him paint his private parts with jam and force him to walk through a swarm of bees.

[ancienthibby]

Do you think that will happen? £650,000 a year is outrageous, when the tax-payer is having to fork out. Unbelievable! :bitchy:

Much as though we are all entitled to be outraged, this will be a private pension funded by RBS over his years of service. It is private because he is taking it at age 50, that's the rule.

Still obscene!

[hibsbollah]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7912651.stm

£16 million for gross irresponsibility:bitchy:
'To make the poor work harder, you pay them less. To make the rich work harder, you pay them more'

[LiverpoolHibs]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7912651.stm

£16 million for gross irresponsibility:bitchy:
'To make the poor work harder, you pay them less. To make the rich work harder, you pay them more'

Prescott has it right, take it off him and see if the grasping ******* has the front to sue.

[Betty Boop]

Prescott has it right, take it off him and see if the grasping ******* has the front to sue.:agree: What a farce!

[JoeT]

Pinched from the Mash:

GORDON Brown last night dismissed calls to surrender his £123,000 a year pension when he is forced to stop being prime minister next June.


He also has a nice big house which you pay for. Mr Brown was defiant in the face of City outrage despite the UK government's annual operating loss of £100bn, rising to £1.5 trillion when the write-down of its banking assets is taken into account.

The prime minister said: "I've been building up this pension since I became an MP, it's all completely legal and now you want to take it away because I've been catastrophically bad at my job and you're looking for a scapegoat. What gives?"

He added: "Yes I've been in charge of financial regulation for 12 years, yes I encouraged the housing bubble, and yes I pissed billions up the wall giving pointless jobs to Labour voters, but I fail to see what any of this has to do with me being incredibly well off."

Brown's £3m pension pot is expected to cast the spotlight on the extravagant retirement packages of other failed politicians including Alistair Darling's inexplicable £1.7m and the £1.5m awarded to John Prescott for being a national scandal for 10 years.

Meanwhile Margaret Beckett has a fund worth £1.7m, something called 'Hilary Armstrong' has £1.2m and Tessa Jowell has £1m even though no-one has the faintest idea what any of them actually did.

Critics insist Mr Brown has a moral duty to hand back his pension fund as he will inevitably receive a multi-million pound advance for two volumes of eye-gougingly tedious memoirs which will end up in the bargain bucket at WH Smith within a fortnight.

Martin Bishop, head of pension rows at the Institute for Studies, said: "It's a fascinating dynamic. The politicians blame the bankers, the bankers blame the politicians, and the ordinary taxpayer is down on all fours with a confused look on his face, being £$%^&* at both ends."

[Sergio sledge]

Is this a private pension fund, like what I have, which I have been contributing to for the past 2 years of my work? If so, why shouldn't he get it? He's put in his contributions while he was working, no matter how good or bad he was at it, and he should be entitled to what he is entitled to according to the amount in the fund.

If someone was to turn round to me when I retired and ask me to give back a lot of my pension because I hadn't been good at my job, even though I had contributed to the fund for years, I'd be peeed off.

If they are going to take it off him, it is also unfair "asking" for him to give it back, because if he doesn't, the government will turn round and say "oh look he's a bad man, be angry at him, not us, even though we are the ones who were supposed to be regulating all this..." There's no way he can come out well, unless he gives back some of the money. In reality who in their right mind would voluntarily give up their pension?

If it is not one that he has contributed to, and is just a negotiated retirement package it is ridiculous. :greengrin

[Andy74]

Is this a private pension fund, like what I have, which I have been contributing to for the past 2 years of my work? If so, why shouldn't he get it? He's put in his contributions while he was working, no matter how good or bad he was at it, and he should be entitled to what he is entitled to according to the amount in the fund.

If someone was to turn round to me when I retired and ask me to give back a lot of my pension because I hadn't been good at my job, even though I had contributed to the fund for years, I'd be peeed off.

If they are going to take it off him, it is also unfair "asking" for him to give it back, because if he doesn't, the government will turn round and say "oh look he's a bad man, be angry at him, not us, even though we are the ones who were supposed to be regulating all this..." There's no way he can come out well, unless he gives back some of the money. In reality who in their right mind would voluntarily give up their pension?

If it is not one that he has contributed to, and is just a negotiated retirement package it is ridiculous. :greengrin


He didn't have to pay into it himself.

I know Sir Fred is the current scapegoat here but this whole row is a bit too far, a pension isn't based on performance and whether he made wrong decisions or not he is still entitled to the terms in his pension plan.

The FSA have failed here too and I gather they ar still on decent bonuses and will have their pensions unaffected.

Lord Myners is not without his own compromise agreements in his own past!!

[sadtom]

He didn't have to pay into it himself.

I know Sir Fred is the current scapegoat here but this whole row is a bit too far, a pension isn't based on performance and whether he made wrong decisions or not he is still entitled to the terms in his pension plan.

The FSA have failed here too and I gather they ar still on decent bonuses and will have their pensions unaffected.

Lord Myners is not without his own compromise agreements in his own past!!

Its also being pointed out in the press that without the taxpayers bailout then RBS would have went bust. In those circumstances he would receive less than £30k a year.
Personally i'd shoot the greedy piece of ***** in the head and do the same to any member of the vermins bloodline that came forward to make a claim on his pension. The money then reverts back to the state.
Bobsyeruncle, problem solved.

There is a far greater crime than robbing a bank - and thats owning one.
- Brecht

[LiverpoolHibs]

Its also being pointed out in the press that without the taxpayers bailout then RBS would have went bust. In those circumstances he would receive less than £30k a year.
Personally i'd shoot the greedy piece of ***** in the head and do the same to any member of the vermins bloodline that came forward to make a claim on his pension. The money then reverts back to the state.
Bobsyeruncle, problem solved.

There is a far greater crime than robbing a bank - and thats owning one.
- Brecht

Ooooh, I like that. Good old Bertie.

[ancienthibby]

He didn't have to pay into it himself.

I know Sir Fred is the current scapegoat here but this whole row is a bit too far, a pension isn't based on performance and whether he made wrong decisions or not he is still entitled to the terms in his pension plan.

The FSA have failed here too and I gather they ar still on decent bonuses and will have their pensions unaffected.

Lord Myners is not without his own compromise agreements in his own past!!

Not really the issues at stake here!

First is the law of contract: How would you like it if someone you had contracted with your money, arrived at your door and said there's been a bit of a problem which means I can't fulfill our contract and you you have lost £10,000??

Then there is your contracted pension: You have made every contribution you could afford, you have planned for your retirement wisely, then the pension provider comes along and says 'we are almost bankrupt', so we are withholding 80% of your pension entitlement!!

Forget the actual Freddie numbers, for they are obscene.

But FredtheShred does have a legally binding contract with his pension provider (not RBS) and he absolutely has the right to give 2-fingers to the hypocrites in the Government (MP's housing allowances, expenses anyone?). The pension numbers as publicised today were included in the RBS Annual Report for 2007!!!

What he should have done (and may still do) is to also announce that he had set up the FredtheShred Charitable Trust into which at least 50% of his monthly pension would go.

If he did this he would be transformed from a villian to a hero overnight and would maybe have some of these incredibly hypoctitical parliamentarians immediately deposed their moral high ground!!

[Betty Boop]

Privatising the Post Office and Nationalising banks, you couldnae make it up!:bitchy: You would think we were under the Tories already.

[Pete]

Surely the queen has the right to strip this man of his nighthood.

Contracts or not, surely this man has no moral right to this obscene amount of money? He's overseen the rise and ultimate fall of this bank yet he walks away with all this.
There's no accountability...the people who are left to bear the brunt are the normal £15k a year people who are bricking themselves about whether they can afford their next mortgage payment.

I get the feeling it's all wind and pish from the politicians when it comes to this.


The way people are feeling wind and pish just isn't good enough.

[Mike777]

What about his knighthood should that not be removed?
i just read he was knighted in 2004 for services to banking, well now 5 years on he as taken "early retirement" left behind a crippled bank with a very fat pension for 50 year old.

This country has all the information on his service's lead to a disaster.

i'd personally think he deserves jail for quite simply day light robbery.

[hibiedude]

I'm not for one second supporting Sir Fred Godwin's pension rights but was it not the labour government that signed this crazy deal and now that it's out in the public domain it has left Brown and Co with some awkward questions, like how can you justify this deal when the RBS has record loses on it's books.

This is about Labour looking to take action when infact it's a done deal and no change of law can be back dated. I THINK :rolleyes:

[Betty Boop]

I'm not for one second supporting Sir Fred Godwin's pension rights but was it not the labour government that signed this crazy deal and now that it's out in the public domain it has left Brown and Co with some awkward questions, like how can you justify this deal when the RBS has record loses on it's books.

This is about Labour looking to take action when infact it's a done deal and no change of law can be back dated. I THINK :rolleyes:No; but can they not introduce new legislation to stop him getting such an obscene reward for failure? :dunno:

[hibiedude]

No; but can they not introduce new legislation to stop him getting such an obscene reward for failure? :dunno:

No sure, but Jeff Randall Skynews money man say No law that's introdused Now can be back dated. And the fact Sir Fred Godwin refused his lump sum of over 1 million when he stepped down makes his case watertight. Jeff Randall was speaking to City Lawyers the other night. Harriet Harman says Sir Fred Godwin is guilty in the public opinion court, not sure what she meant by those coments :greengrin

[Betty Boop]

No sure, but Jeff Randall Skynews money man say No law that's introdused Now can be back dated. And the fact Sir Fred Godwin refused his lump sum of over 1 million when he stepped down makes his case watertight. Jeff Randall was speaking to City Lawyers the other night. Harriet Harman says Sir Fred Godwin is guilty in the public opinion court, not sure what she meant by those coments :greengrin Maybe we should all take to the streets, like the Irish a couple of weeks ago. :grr:

[Betty Boop]

Interest rates cut to 0.5% and quantitative easing, what a state of affairs. :grr: