Matt Taibbi: Why is the American media ignoring the massive LIBOR scandal?
It's a story of unparalleled financial fuckery, market manipulation by the banks--at the expense of ordinary people--on an unprecedented scale.
And no one in the Mainstream Media is giving this any attention? What. The. Hell?
Why is Nobody Freaking Out About the LIBOR Banking Scandal? | Matt Taibbi | Rolling Stone
The LIBOR manipulation story, appropriately, has exploded into a major scandal overseas. The CEO of Barclays, Bob Diamond, has resigned in disgrace; his was the first of what will undoubtedly be many major banks to walk the regulatory plank for fixing the interbank exchange rate. The Labor party is demanding a sweeping criminal investigation. Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England, responded the way a real public official should (i.e. not like Ben Bernanke), blasting the banks:
It is time to do something about the banking system…Many people in the banking industry are hardworking and feel badly let down by some of their colleagues and leaders. It goes to the culture and the structure of banks: the excessive compensation, the shoddy treatment of customers, the deceitful manipulation of a key interest rate, and today, news of yet another mis-selling scandal.
All of England is in a furor about the revelations that Barclays, the Royal Bank of Scotland, and other banks were involved monkeying with at least $10 trillion in loans (The Wall Street Journal is calculating that that LIBOR affects $800 trillion worth of contracts). The banks gamed LIBOR for two semi-overlapping reasons. . . .
