Libor, Set by Fewer Banks, Losing Status as a Benchmark

After being rigged by some of the world’s biggest financial institutions, the London interbank offered rate, the benchmark for more than $300 trillion of securities and loans, is now increasingly being set by a smaller group of banks.

Bloomberg reports that Bank of America, Citigroup, Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd., Royal Bank of Canada, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc. and Lloyds Banking Group’s submissions have been used in setting the rate on an almost daily basis in the past four months, data compiled by Bloomberg show.

Two years ago, none of the 18 designated lenders made it into every fixing of the measure, which excludes outliers by stripping out the four highest and lowest contributions.

'You have a core group setting the rate and that’s a major concern', said Bret Barker, a money manager at Los Angeles- based TCW Group Inc., which oversees $128bn. 'It’s going to be very tough to fix that and very tough to replace Libor'.

While Libor is supposed to represent the interest rates banks pay each other for short-term loans, the dominance of a smaller group shows the measure is failing to accurately reflect the true health of the financial system and borrowing costs.

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Libor, Set by Fewer Banks, Losing Status as a Benchmark

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