Regulating in the Shadow of Big Banking. Paul Carliers Talk at the Transparency Task Force and the failings of the FCA under Andrew Bailey.

rogerglewis March 19, 2021 10 Comments

I attended a virtual symposium last night I believe the Zoom recording will be on the youtube channel.
The main speaker was a gentleman called Paul Carlier, Covering Lloyds, HBOS and the FCA regulation of amongst other things FRAUD. One section of Paul’s Talk covered the Pricing structure of interest rate swap products in the US by some British Flagged Banks, and the approach to pricing and selling these products to their account holders for which HBOS were fined a few Million/Billions, Who is keeping score?, . The same practice essentially was in operation across all markets including the UK. Specifically this was the practice of adding mark up to technical swap products at a predatory rate to what were called unsophisticated clients. The practice effectively demonstrated that Account Holders were seen as Marks or Dupes and not as customers.

The effect of the these “White Collar” crimes is not victimless as we know all to well, Banking at the high street level is more akin to a utility than to a commercial product as such it should be regulated as such.
Recently we saw in Texas the effect of the Enronisation of the Energy market in Texas. Yesterday, the announcement about the auction for the licences on the 5G network were announced another Utility which is not regulated as it should be, Water utilities have also suffered from the same monopolistic/oligopolistic practices.

The Point Tom Thatcher makes “I just want somebody to talk to.” point above is a very simple one and will be profound for most of us but the complexity of very notion of their customer being heard or having a voice and advocate or a platform in the corridors of both Corporate and Bureaucratic power will be alien to the algorithmic minds of the HALS in the 21st Century Global Banking odyssey.
@Carlier_J87

No pressure then. There is some new evidence regarding Blackmore Bond that I've received in just the last 24 hours, that is pure dynamite. I have included in the presentation…… https://t.co/xKufmI5G6U

— Paul Carlier (@Carlier_J87) March 18, 2021

When the Video of the Talk is uploaded I will post it back here , meanwhile Here is a Link to the Transparency Task Force Site

https://www.transparencytaskforce.org/about-the-transparency-task-force/

and the recent talk by another of last nights speakers Mark Bishop

This film Spank the Banker does not get nearly enough coverage, there are a number of others, Inside Job, The Emperors New Clothes The Money Masters The Princes of the yen

Kevin Hollinrake MP Made the introductory comments to the keynote talk. In Kevins comments he quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson
“An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man”

― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance

This is an interesting quote and perhaps gets to the heart of what is wrong with the FCA. Not in the way the quote leads one intuitively to think but much more in the way of my Friend and former Bank Manager Tom Thatcher Author of the above Linkedin post which provoked this blog.

It’s always interesting watching banks and financial institutions trying to rename, restructure and reinvent themselves.

Having spent some hours with local farmers recently, one of them summed it all up in seven words:

“I just want somebody to talk to.”

So before millions are spent on new apps, rebranding, new websites and old/new products, for God’s sake look after your front-line staff and make sure that there are plenty of them. You will be successful and respected.

And look very hard at middle managers with incomprehensible job titles: and external contractors charging a fortune to design logos and snappy publicity. None of these will be there to help an exhausted farmer who’s lost two calves in one night and has ten hours of work ahead

It’s always interesting watching banks and financial institutions trying to rename, restructure and reinvent themselves. Having spent some hours with local farmers recently, one of them summed it all up in seven words: “I just want somebody to talk to.” So before millions are spent on new apps, rebranding, new websites and old/new products, for God’s sake look after your front-line staff and make sure that there are plenty of them. You will be successful and respected. And look very hard at middle managers with incomprehensible job titles: and external contractors charging a fortune to design logos and snappy publicity. None of these will be there to help an exhausted farmer who’s lost two calves in one night and has ten hours of work ahead

In the spirit of going quote to quote with Kevin I offer this Quote from John Dewey, I first heard it quoted by Noam Chomsky.

And that gave us our title.

Regulating in the Shadow of Big Banking. Paul Carliers Talk at the Transparency Task Force and the failings of the FCA under Andrew Bailey.
Paul Carlier Blew the Whistle on Lloyds, With shadow of Banking over the FCA being as dominant as it is are whistle blowing protocols really set up to protect the institutions from financial and reputational harm rather than reforming illegal, and Fraudulent wrongdoing which is systemic in the revolving door culture of Westminster Bubble Politics.

“Political analysts claim that an unhealthy relationship can develop between the private sector and government, based on the granting of reciprocated privileges to the detriment of the nation, and can lead to regulatory capture”.