
The Man Who Invented Libor (2016) - astdb
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-11-29/the-man-who-invented-libor-iw3fpmed
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keithpeter
David Enrich wrote _The Spider Network_ about the manipulation of Libor in the
2007-ish era that resulted in a long prison sentence for the trader Tom Hayes
(who may have Aspergers').

Libor like 'gentleman's agreements' depend on a shared understanding of the
barriers. Tough if you don't see barriers...

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msh
Why does it matter that he have asperges?

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killin_dan
It was an obnoxious piece of the trial. Not relevant imo.

Maybe relevant for who he is as a person I suppose, but not according to the
trial evidence and the case as it was brought before the court.

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keithpeter
The reason I mentioned it is that the condition may have been the reason that
Hayes did not 'see' the boundary between a bank taking into account its
advantage when arriving at its own Libor submission on the one hand, and the
wholesale cooperation between several banks and brokerages on the other. That
boundary was largely social and not documented/codified.

I was thinking in terms of mitigation.

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killin_dan
I would think anyone even remotely familiar with economics would realize how
significant even small groups of agents and how they can have rippling effects
across an economy.

Maybe there was a lapse in judgment somewhere, but that doesn't excuse him
from doing what he did, and that lapse can't justify his actions, which caused
HUNDREDS of billions of dollars of misleading money to move around.

However, I think he was too harshly sentenced, and I think these "make an
example out of him" cowboy judges only exasperate the situation even more. If
I were committing global-scale fraud right about now, I'd spend even more time
and take even more caution to make sure that I can't be caught or unmasked.
Hayes will serve as an inspiration to future fraudsters, you can count on
that.

