Commodities Trading: Nick Leeson‚ Internal Controls and the Collapse of Barings Bank __________________________________________________________________________________________ Commodities Trading: Nick Leeson‚ Internal Controls and the Collapse of Barings Bank By Sam Bhugaloo Page 1 of 21 Commodities Trading: Nick Leeson‚ Internal Controls and the Collapse of Barings Bank __________________________________________________________________________________________ Table of Content
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Events leading to Barings Bank’s collapse Barings Bank’s activities in Singapore between 1992 and 1995 enabled Nick Leeson to operate effectively without supervision from Barings Bank in London. Leeson acted both as head of settlement operations (charged with ensuring accurate accounting) and as floor manager for Barings’ trading onSingapore International Monetary Exchange‚ or SIMEX. This placed Leeson in the position of reporting to an office inside Barings Bank which he himself held. Because
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MBA Topic: Barings Bank Scandal 1995 Professor: Dr. Goran Ridic Student: Dinka Lujinovic Sarajevo‚ 2014 Content Contents Introduction 5 Research methodology 6 Nick Leeson 6 Barings Bank 8 Nick Leeson and the collapse of Barings Bank 9 Risk Management and Internal Control 9 Conclusion 12 Reference list 13 Introduction Barings Bank was established in 1762 by Francis Baring. It was known as John and Francis Baring Company and was one of the oldest merchant banks in United Kingdom
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REVIEW QUESTIONS 1. Why did Nick Leeson sell numerous short straddles for each long futures contract he bought? When Nick Leeson was being promoted on the Singapore branch of the Barings bank‚ the strategy of the bank was to reduce the risk exposure by using a combination of one short straddle (combination of put / call) and for one long future. Since Nick Leeson used to be a specialist on Future contracts on Nikkei 225 and Japanese 10 years bond and was sure this market would arise. So
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Barings Bank & the “Rogue Trader” Founded in 1762‚ Barings Bank (previously known as Baring Brothers & Co.) was the oldest merchant banking company in England. Barings collapsed on February 26‚ 1995 as the result of the activities of one of its traders‚ Nick Leeson‚ who lost $1.4 billion by investing in the Singapore International Monetary Exchange (SIMEX) with primarily derivative securities. This was actually the second time the bank had been faced with bankruptcy. Following the collapse‚ Barings
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history of Baring traces back to 1762. Once remarked as one of the six great powers in Europe‚ it was the oldest merchant bank in the United Kingdom at the time of its collapse (Robert 2002). Initially its main business was financing foreign trade. After the deregulation of financial market in 1986‚ Barings expanded aggressively into derivative trading and recruited some extreme risk takers. Aiming at being the pioneer in speculative derivative trading‚ The Bank appointed Nick Leeson who seemed to
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Baring’s Bank in 1995 occurred principally as a result of huge losses that resulted from unauthorized derivatives trading activity by the head of the Singapore office‚ Nick Leeson.[1] The chain of events that led to the collapse of the bank could have been mitigated‚ if not entirely avoided‚ had management and/or the board of directors followed recommendations contained in internal reports that drew attention to the risks present in the highly leveraged trading program constructed by Nick Leeson‚ or by
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collapse of Barings Bank was one of the biggest financial failures in modern history. The events that transpired changed the way risk management and proper corporate structure would be viewed by the world. This case study will chronicle the events that took place‚ identify the failures‚ and recommend how these events could have been avoided. To chronicle the events‚ books and articles of the event were read to understand how Nick Leeson’s activities caused the fall of Barings Bank. Failures such
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This story begins with a former back office clerk being promoted to a derivatives trader for Barings Bank’s Singapore Branch and ends with the collapse of a 232-year old banking empire. As we began researching this assignment‚ we all asked the same question‚ "How does a 28 year old trader bring about the collapse of a 232-year old banking empire?" To understand how this debacle came about‚ one must have a basic understanding of the nature of a derivative and what they are designed to do. Initially
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Fall of Barings Bank The story of Barings Bank shows how overconfidence‚ coupled with poor internal control‚ can even bring down an historic financial institution. Below we provide a few teaching points. Nick Leeson seemed to have all the characteristics of an overconfident trader. As described in the chapter‚ excessive trading‚ lack of diversification‚ and too much risk were obviously present. Self-attribution bias seemed to play a major role. One commentator notes that Leeson “got overconfident
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