Off the wire
• Roundup: Great efforts needed to realize Vietnam's economic growth in 2016: commission  • Forbidden City gets its own mobile game  • Storm-battered fish under pressure of climate change: New Zealand study  • Rubber, mineral ores weigh as Laos economic growth revised to 6.9 per cent  • British inquiry vindicates New Zealand's abstention from Iraq invasion: lawmakers  • Roundup: Samsung Electronics post earnings surprise in Q2 on smartphone sales  • 3rd Ld Writethru: Cop, attacker dead after gunfight near Bangladesh's largest Eid congregation venue  • Roundup: Bangladesh Muslims celebrate Eid-ul-Fitr with heavy hearts  • 12 detained for dumping garbage in Suzhou  • Russia's weekly inflation up 0.4 pct  
You are here: 　 Home

Aussie extradited to U.S. to face LIBOR charges

Xinhua, July 7, 2016 Adjust font size:

A former Rabobank trader has been extradited from Australia to the United States to face fraud changes for his role in the global Libor-rigging scandal.

Former money trader for Dutch-based Rabobank, Australian high-flyer Paul Thompson was challenging his extradition to the U.S. for his role in fixing the London Inter Bank Offered Rate (LIBOR) between May 2006 and early 2011 following a U.S. grand jury indictment.

Thompson however has surrendered himself to U.S. authorities and is currently being extradited to New York, Fairfax Media reported on Thursday.

It's believed Thompson will enter a guilty plea when he reaches the Manhattan Federal Court in New York, global news agency Reuters reported, sighting the man's lawyer.

LIBOR is one of the global key benchmark interest rates overseen by the British Bankers Association, representing 200 banks in more than 60 countries, underpinning hundreds of trillions of dollars of financial products from mortgages to credit cards.

The scandal has seen banks fined billions of dollars while dozens of people have also been charged with rigging the rates to boost profits.

In light of the LIBOR scandal Australian authorities have been probing the local Bank Bill Swap Rate (BBSW) - LIBOR equivalent - involving the nation's four major banking institutions, which has so far netted seven traders at ANZ Banking Group. The regulator is also undertaking civil proceedings against ANZ, Westpac and the National Australia Bank.

Thompson, former managing director and head of liquidity and finance for Rabobank Asia along with former colleagues allegedly intended to manipulate to their advantage the benchmark interest rates and engaged in a scheme to obtain money and property by making false and fraudulent U.S. dollar and Japanese Yen LIBOR submissions.

The alleged manipulation occurred at their offices in Singapore, London, Tokyo and Utrecht in the Netherlands between May 2006 and early 2011.

The U.S. grand jury indictment also names former London-based colleague Lee Stewart and indicates four of their former colleagues have become U.S. prosecution witnesses. Endit