Barclays yesterday confirmed it was under investigation along with its chief executive officer Jes Staley over his attempts to uncover the identity of a whistle-blower within the British financial giant.
In a statement, Barclays said the British Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) have “commenced investigations into Jes Staley, as to his senior manager responsibilities relating to Barclays’ whistle-blowing program, and Barclays Bank.”
The board said it had accepted Staley’s explanation that he did not know he was not allowed to try to identify the author of a whistle-blowing letter sent last year.
“The board has concluded that Mr Staley honestly, but mistakenly, believed that it was permissible to identify the author of the letter,” it said.
The bank vowed to “cooperate fully” with the FCA and PRA investigations and said that “a very significant compensation adjustment” would be made to Staley’s pay packet this year.
Staley said he had apologized to the Barclays board and accepted its findings.
“Our whistle-blowing process is one of the most important means by which we protect our culture and values at Barclays, and I certainly want to ensure that all colleagues, and others who may utilize it, understand the criticality which I attach to it,” he said.
An anonymous letter was sent to board members last year raising concerns about a senior employee who had recently been recruited, including issues of a personal nature, the bank explained.
Staley requested that the bank’s Group Information Security team find who wrote the letter which he viewed as “an unfair personal attack on the senior employee.”
The board found out about Staley’s actions early this year and instructed an external law firm, Simmons & Simmons, to investigate. It also informed the FCA and PRA.
“I am personally very disappointed and apologetic that this situation has occurred, particularly as we strive to operate to the highest possible ethical standards,” bank chairman John McFarlane said.
The British bank, which was hit hard by the financial crisis, appointed Staley, a former JPMorgan investment banker, as its chief executive in 2015.
The 60-year-old American declared on his appointment that he would seek to “preserve and enhance” trust in the lender, whose reputation was badly damaged by foreign exchange and LIBOR benchmark interest rate rigging scandals.
Staley’s predecessor Antony Jenkins was sacked by the bank in July 2015 in the wake of the scandals.
Jenkins had been in the job since July 2012 when he replaced Bob Diamond — who himself was forced to resign after the LIBOR rate-fixing scandal.
In May 2015, Barclays was hit with a fine of US$2.3 billion by US and British regulators for manipulation of foreign exchange trading. Five other global banks have been fined over the affair.
In 2012, the bank was fined US$424.4 million by British and US regulators for attempted manipulation of LIBOR and EURIBOR interbank rates between 2005 and 2009.
In January, the bank announced a new round of job cuts, axing 1,200 positions at its investment banking division, exiting Russia and closing offices across Asia.
The job losses were the first round of cutbacks unveiled by Staley and followed a wave of 7,000 job cuts which began in 2014.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last