Banks brace for more foreign exchange rigging exposure as civil lawsuits emerge

From YAHOO! Finance –

“Class-action cases are expected to follow vast fines for manipulating currency benchmarks.

Banks are bracing for hundreds of millions of pounds in new claims for foreign exchange manipulation from class-action lawsuits triggered by last week’s vast market rigging fines .

Barclays, Royal Bank of Scotland and four other banks were ordered on Wednesday to pay $6bn (£3.84bn) by UK and US authorities.

The Barclays penalty represents the biggest bank fine in British history.

The regulators, detailing how traders gathered in chatrooms using monikers such as “The Cartel” and “Coiled cobra” to rig the $5.3 trillion-a-day currency market, also forced the banks to plead guilty to criminal charges.

Lawyers say that the fines, as well as an investigation from the European Commission, could be a springboard to damaging civil litigation in the UK and Europe.”

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Barclays Bank launches Twitter payments

From Biz Report -

“Banks are fighting off competition from digital payment providers such as PayPal by slowly adopting their own digital banking processes. Barclays Bank in the UK has joined with Twitter to become the first in the country to allow payments via Twitter.

Within the next month, Barclays Bank will launch a mobile payment method, available to both iOS and Android users, allowing transactions between individuals and small businesses through Twitter. Around 80% of Twitter users in the UK now access the social network via their mobile device.”

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Barclays to launch over-50s apprenticeship scheme

From Bobs Guide –

“Barclays has launched an apprenticeship scheme for people over-50s who want a career in banking. The scheme, which will place former middle-aged trainees such as former accountants and maths teachers at the bottom of the workforce with the chance to work their way up, will be advertised in the summer and piloted later this year.

The move comes after older worker’s advocate, Dr Ros Altmann warned more should be done to offer employers incentives to train and retain older workers. It is believed that trainees will learn banking skills including calculating credit risks and according to the Sunday Times, Barclays said over-50 year olds have advantages over apprentices aged 16-24.”

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Barclays MD for mobile banking & Pingit insists bank branches are ‘critical’

From The Drum

“Despite the mass migration of banking services to mobile devices, Barclays' managing director for mobile banking and Pingit, Darren Foulds, has insisted that high-street bank branches are “critical” for the business and “a fundamental part of what we do”.

Speaking at The Drum’s Digital Disruption Day event, Foulds said Barclays views its high-street branches as more than a place to provide services to customers, since it implemented the Digital Eagles scheme to teach those who haven’t yet made the shift to digital how to use emails or Skype.

“The bank branches are really critical for us, fundamentally we have bank branches on most major high streets, and they are the point at which people want to come in to and get advice around the services.”

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BNP Fine Spotlights Banks’ Need for In-House Police Force

From Bloomberg

‘ “It’s actually a very hot market right now,” said Mike Roemer, who became head of compliance at London-based Barclays Plc (BARC) in January. Today the role is seen “as an integral part of how companies manage the overall risk of the organization,” he said.

After the U.S. extracted almost $12 billion in fines in settlements with France’s BNP Paribas SA (BNP) and Zurich-based Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN) since May, European firms say they’re overhauling culture and boosting pay for compliance staff faster than for revenue-earning bankers. Still lawyers question whether this will be enough to deter future misdeeds as authorities around the world probe alleged manipulation of interest rate, foreign exchange and gold benchmarks.’

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