Saturday 14 February 2009

Naming the guilty

The financial crisis is getting personal, with the press beginning to single out individual bankers...

HBOS’s aggressive corporate banking division was revealed to have been at the heart of the £10 billion shock loss announced by Lloyds Banking Group yesterday. Lloyds Banking Group issued a warning that HBOS, the ailing bank it has taken over, made a whopping £7 billion of corporate losses last year after making bad bets on business lending.

Lloyds admitted that HBOS’s corporate division, which was run by Peter Cummings — the highest-paid executive at the bank — has had to write off £7 billion of bad loans, far more than HBOS’s management ever admitted. Mr Cummings is understood to have left in early January with a payoff thought to be about £660,000 and £6 million of pension entitlements.


Yesterday's star, becomes today's scapegoat. Lets hope that Mr. Cummings doesn't become a sponge to soak up all the blame. There are plenty of other culprits out there, hiding behind Cummings, Crosby and the other gamblers from HBOS.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wasn't the merger (take over) of HBOS by Lloyds the personal triumph of our GLORIOUS Leader, Mr Brown?

Does absolutely everything that man touches turn to shit?

Anonymous said...

All these guys need to be named, their photos and addresses and habits posted on the internet so people can find them. What happens next should not be any of our concern. But get that information out there. Now!

Mitch said...

this is gordon using them as a "human" shield they will all take a bullet.
He will sacrifice anyone to avoid blame.

pitiful really

Anonymous said...

This is as close to a public hanging as we're going to get. It will fade with time and those concerned will retire quietly behind the security of their gated communities, making way for the next tier of spivs. Be in no doubt, more like them are lurking in the wings, licking their lips and sharpening their knives in readiness for the next carve-up.

Anonymous said...

With HBOS, I want to know what the fallout was from T-M-B (the Halifax division for sub-prime lending.)

TMB 2007 offerings

TMB today

I know, for example, that it was possible for someone (without a job) to borrow ~£300K from TMB... Yet, in spite of this clearly representing UK sub-prime, little/no mention is made by the press.