Four City traders’ seek appeal against Libor convictions following landmark ruling
Four former City traders with criminal convictions plan to appeal after the Supreme Court overturned the convictions of Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo on Wednesday.
Barclays traders Jay Merchant, Philippe Moryoussef, and Jonathan Mathew, along with Deutsche Bank trader Christian Bittar, who were all charged and convicted, are now seeking to appeal their convictions.
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court overturned the convictions of former City traders Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo, who had been jailed for manipulating Libor and Euribor rates, ruling that their original trials were unfair due to inaccurate jury instructions.
The Libor scandal
The Libor scandal centred on the manipulation of the London Interbank Offered Rate by traders at major financial institutions.
Uncovered in 2012, an investigation into the LIBOR scandal revealed that the banks involved had colluded with each other to manipulate the LIBOR rate, with one bank, Barclays, accused of manipulating the rate for profit between 2005 and 2009.
The 54-year-old benchmark borrowing rate was permanently retired by the City regulator in October.
The scandal prompted the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) to launch an investigation, resulting in nine convictions of senior bankers for fraud offences—two pleaded guilty, while seven were found guilty by a jury.
However, following the Supreme Court’s decision, the SFO announced it would not seek a retrial against Hayes and Palombo, effectively ending a decade-long legal battle.
On Thursday evening, law firm Hickman & Rose, representing Merchant, Moryoussef, Mathew, and Bittar, announced its intention to appeal all their convictions.
Mathew and Merchant were convicted by juries in 2016. Mathew received a four-year sentence, while Merchant was initially sentenced to six and a half years, later reduced to five and a half years on appeal.
Bittar pleaded guilty in 2018 and was sentenced to five years and four months in prison. Moryoussef was convicted in absentia after refusing to attend court and leaving for France..