If you want to know the scoop on the Barclays fine, press here.
In the meantime, here's some email evidence (released in the FSA report), which also sets the scene.
1. Trader: 'When I retire and write a book about this business, your name will be written in golden letters'.
Submitter: 'I would prefer this (to) not be in any book!'
2. Submitter: 'Hi all, just as an FYI, I will be in noonish on Monday'.
Trader: 'Noonish ? Who's going to put my low fixings in ? hehehe'.
3. Submitter: '(A manager has) asked me to put it lower than it was yesterday … to send the message that we're not in the shit'.
4. Submitter to manager: 'We are therefore being dishonest by definition and are at risk of damaging our reputation in the market and with the regulators'.
5. Trader to manager, complaining about a submitter: '(He is putting in_ the highest Libor of anybody … He's like, I think this is where it should be. I'm like, dude, you're killing us'.
Manager to trader: 'Just tell him to keep it, to put it low'.
Submitter '(I will) see what I can do'.
6. External trader to a Barclays trader, asking for a lower Libor submission: 'If it comes in unchanged I'm a dead man'.
Barclays' trader promises to 'have a chat'.
External trader to Barclays' trader later that day: 'Dude. I owe you big time! Come over one day after work and I'm opening a bottle of Bollinger'.
7. Trader: 'Coffees will be coming your way, either way, just to say thank you for your help in the past few weeks'.
Submitter: 'Done … for you big boy'.
8. Swaps trader: 'Sorry to be a pain but just to remind you the importance of a low fixing for us today'.
Barclays’ senior Euribor submitter: 'No problem, I had not forgotten. The brokers are going for 3.372, we will put in 36 for our contribution'.
Swaps trader: 'I love you'.
9. Barclays trader to another trader outside the firm: 'This is the way you pull off deals like this chicken, don't talk about it too much, 2 months of preparation... the trick is you do not do this alone ... this is between you and me but really don't tell ANYBODY'.
Sources - Financial Services Authority, The Guardian, Reuters, New York Times
The Billionaire's Apprentice
The Buy Side: A Wall Street Trader's Tale of Spectacular Excess
