InterBank Rate rigging probe escalates in UK and Germany
(Reuters) - A global investigation into manipulation of interbank lending rates widened on Friday with Britain's fraud squad taking up the case and sources telling Reuters that Germany's markets regulator had launched a probe into Deutsche Bank.
Authorities in the United States, Europe, Japan and Canada are examining more than a dozen big banks over suspected rigging of the London Interbank Offered Rate (Libor). Britain's Barclays has so far been the only bank to admit wrongdoing, agreeing last week to pay a fine of more than $450 million.
The rate-fixing scandal has exploded into the front ranks of politics, especially in Britain, where politicians say the bankers responsible should end up in jail. [...] In Britain, the lack of criminal prosecutions of the rate fixing has been one of the issues infuriating politicians, after e-mails were published showing bankers boasting of fiddling figures and congratulating each other with offers of champagne.
Reuters
