A "Series of Bad Decisions"

The FSA has announced that it will not take any enforcement action against the ex CEO of RBS, Fred "The Shred" Goodwin; the FSA has now closed its 18-month probe into the conduct of RBS executives, the acquisition of ABN Amro in 2007 and a 2008 rights offering.

The Telegraph quotes the FSA:

"The review confirmed that RBS made a series of bad decisions in the years immediately before the financial crisis, most significantly the acquisition of ABN AMRO.

The review concluded that these bad decisions were not the result of a lack of integrity by any individual and we did not identify any instances of fraud or dishonest activity.

The competence of RBS individuals can, and will, be taken into account in any future applications made by them to work at FSA regulated firms.."

The last sentence is the FSA's attempt to add "stones" to their statement of the "bleedin' obvious", namely that "a series of bad decisions" had been made.

The FSA won't disclose details of its investigation, they expect people to blithely accept their opinion and move on.

Not really very much to show for 18 months of "investigation"!

Did not our government, during the run up to the election, say that they were going to shut down the FSA?

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The Eagle Has Landed

Barclays is to abandon its centuries old eagle logo, if the deal with ABN Amro the Dutch bank goers through.

It seems that the eagle, that has adorned Barclays letterheads, branches and all corporate communications since the 1600's has been deemed by the Dutch to be too reminiscent of the Nazi eagle for their taste.

Seemingly Barlcays will work on a new corporate logo, should the deal go through, sans eagle; probably the ABN Amro shield.

Barclays claim that the UK logo will remain the same.

I can't see that being a very bright or practical idea, as it will cause brand confusion and dilute the Barclays image and brand.

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RBS Puts The Boot In

The Royal Bank of Scotland has put the boot in to Barclays bid for ABN Amro Holding NV, by claiming that the Barclays bid would cost 9,000 jobs net.

RBS said its proposed deal would lead to a maximum of 2,000 job losses in Britain, but the Barclays deal would lead to 11,000 losses.

RBS also hit the headlines this weekend, when its cash machines went off line; leaving millions of RBS and NatWest customers in the UK unable to withdraw money.

Although they are now back on line, Royal Bank of Scotland has refused to explain what happened.

The problems started at around 10pm on Friday, when a system failure meant that 13 million customers of RBS and NatWest were unable to use ATMs to take money out of their account. The problem extended to customers trying to use other banks' machines to access funds.

A spokesperson for the banking group said:

"It would be inappropriate to go into any further details due to security implications."

Derek French, director of the Campaign for Community Banking Services, said:

"It is appalling for a bank to be off-line and more importantly unable to deliver cash over a weekend at which point branches will be closed."

Another nail in the coffin of the reputation of British banks.

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Barclays Face Investigation

Barclays face an investigation by the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) as a result of the recent BBC programme "Whistleblower", which placed an undercover reporter in a Barclays call centre and one of their high street branches.

Whistleblower alleged that call centre staff accessed private customer files, and made sales calls to people who asked not to be contacted.

The ICO said that the allegations were a cause for concern.

The BBC placed their undercover reporter in the Doxford call centre in Sunderland, where she found examples of mis-selling, employees lying to customers and security failings.

Quote:

"I've seen customers misled, lied to and treated with contempt. I've seen people charged for financial products they neither asked for or knew they had."

The ICO has asked Barclays for the results of an internal inquiry, and for a copy of its policy on telephone sales.

Barclays said in a statement:

"We take the allegations made by the programme very seriously and are conducting our own internal investigation. Where there has been improper behaviour we will take action to improve what we do. Of course we will also fully co-operate with the Information Commissioner's own investigation."

To add to Barclays humiliation Reuters report that it faces a US investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), into allegations of insider dealing by bank staff who served on bankruptcy committees.

The SEC will look at trading activity between 2002 and 2003 by a proprietary trading desk at Barclays.

A separate lawsuit filed against the bank in March by a former employee alleges that Barclays' U.S. distressed debt desk, which deals in bankrupt company bonds, traded debt after "potentially gaining nonpublic information" through bankruptcy creditor committees.

This has been topped off by the news that a group led by Royal Bank of Scotland says that it plans to go hostile if necessary with an offer for ABN AMRO, the Dutch bank that has already agreed a deal with Barclays.

The hostile bid is estimated to be worth around £49BN, compared with the £45BN offered by Barclays.

Not a happy week for Barclays!

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