Bankrupt Banker

Vince Cable: UK to remove takeover 'wiggle room'

Vince Cable: UK to remove takeover 'wiggle room'

Business Secretary Vince Cable has said he will tighten the rules to deal with foreign takeovers of UK firms. He wants any new regime overse...

Millionaire helping pregnant women flee UK to avoid babies taken into care

<img alt="" height="120" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-wXzYXM62g4A/U8LImQPw2ZI/AAAAAAAAA_8/WPaX-u_jizs/%25255BUNSET%25255D.jpg" style="vertical-align: top;" width="120" />multi-millionaire is helping pregnant women whose babies are deemed at risk to flee the UK. Ian Josephs has spent over £30,000 helping 200 to avoid having their newborns taken away by social services. He pays for their fares to a new life and offers them free legal advice, even paying for lawyers in some cases. Around 50 have fled to Ireland on his money while another 150 went to France, Spain and Italy. Forced adoption opponent Mr Josephs, who runs a language business and has a law degree, has defended his decision to fund their escape, despite many already having children in care. He said: “Social services have moved away from giving families support and are now too quick to take children away. “I know what I do is controversial. People ask how I know the people I’ve helped don’t go on to do something wicked, but my reply is that even killers are entitled to lawyers.

Millionaire helping pregnant women flee UK to avoid babies taken into care

multi-millionaire is helping pregnant women whose babies are deemed at risk to flee the UK. Ian Josephs has spent over £30,000 helping 200 t...

Tories Plan To Make Mental Health ESA Claimants Prove They Are Really Depressed

Critics have expressed horror at Tory plans to make benefit claimants prove they suffer from anxiety or depression, or risk having their pay...

CRITICAL: European Banks Insolvent again

CRITICAL: European Banks Insolvent

UK banks may have to hold more capital than under global rule

<img alt="" height="177" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-UbVJi3R4lY0/U8LEYpsbHtI/AAAAAAAAA_Y/dy73Vgqexs0/%25255BUNSET%25255D.jpg" style="vertical-align: top;" width="284" />The Bank of England (BoE) proposed on Friday that Britain's biggest banks should set aside from 2019 more capital than planned under global rules being drawn up to prevent a repeat of the financial crisis. Launching a public consultation on a new leverage ratio - the amount of capital a bank has to hold as a percentage of total assets - the BoE said many financial institutions may have to set aside funds on top of a global minimum that has yet to be fully agreed.A leverage ratio of 3 percent, the provisional global level, means a bank must hold capital equivalent to 3 percent of its total assets, regardless of how risky they are. "There may be a case to introduce a supplementary leverage ratio component to a subset of firms, for example ring-fenced banks and/or systemically important institutions, whose failure would be most destabilizing for the financial system," the BoE said in a consultation paper. This would cover the bulk of Britain's banks as they have already been deemed to require a ring-fence of extra capital to protect depositors, hold extra capital because of their size, or both. The BoE is proposing two types of supplements, a permanent one for some lenders, and a temporary one to cool credit booms. Some banks would have to comply with both in some circumstances. The supplements may have to comprise the most expensive form of capital, thereby putting limits on a bank's ability to use cheaper hybrid debt known as contingent capital or Cocos. Members of parliament's influential treasury committee want a minimum leverage ratio of 4 percent or above, saying tougher measures are needed to ensure taxpayers are not asked to bail out banks like in the financial crisis. British banks such as Barclays , HSBC , Lloyds and RBS already have to meet a 3 percent target, forcing some to raise more capital. The British Bankers' Association (BBA) said the proposals complicated global plans for a simple, internationally harmonized leverage ratio.

UK banks may have to hold more capital than under global rule

The Bank of England (BoE) proposed on Friday that Britain's biggest banks should set aside from 2019 more capital than planned under glo...

Man pleads guilty to investment fraud scheme

A Louisiana man has pleaded guilty to two counts of mail fraud for executing a $13 million investment fraud scheme that included victims in ...

Financiers may grumble that the United States is acting like an imperial power in punishing foreign banks for dealings far beyond U.S. territory

Financiers may grumble that the United States is acting like an imperial power in punishing foreign banks for dealings far beyond U.S. territory, but in the end they are more likely to bow to Washington than kick against its dollar muscle. Last week, French politicians and business leaders demanded an end to the global dominance of the U.S. currency - and hence of the U.S. banking system - after a New York court fined French bank BNP Paribas $9 billion for doing business in Sudan, Iran and Cuba. Yet despite irritation at the long reach of U.S. sanctions, most bankers see that as wishful thinking. Instead, major lenders in Europe and Asia are reacting to the steady flow of punishments from the United States by doing ever more to comply with U.S. laws and by cutting business ties in countries Washington dislikes rather than risk its wrath and, in the worst scenario, risk exclusion from the dollar system. Official regulators outside the United States are starting to look at ways to prevent their own banks and markets from being damaged by the scale of U.S. penalties. But for now, each bank on its own has little choice but to toe Washington's line. "The demands placed on banks to know their customer's customer, even in countries where such records are not routinely kept, means that banks have little choice but to terminate relationships or risk eye-watering, balance sheet altering fines," said Anthony Browne, chief executive of the British Bankers' Association (BBA). The BBA estimates Western banks have cut hundreds of relationships with correspondent banks in emerging markets, hurting businesses, governments and people in poorer countries.

Financiers may grumble that the United States is acting like an imperial power in punishing foreign banks for dealings far beyond U.S. territory

Financiers may grumble that the United States is acting like an imperial power in punishing foreign banks for dealings far beyond U.S. terri...