Spanish Judge Violates Global Rule, Makes Bank President & Former IMF Chief Pay for Financial Crimes
Bankers never go to jail. This is one of the unwritten new laws to which most of us have grown wearily accustomed in this new post-crisis reality. Also begrudgingly taken for granted is the fact that a banker’s fortune will never be seized or confiscated by the authorities; in today’s new Gilded Age a banker’s gains, whether ill-gotten or not, are his of hers until death do them part.
However, nobody seems to have told any of this to Fernando Andreu, the Spanish judge investigating Bankia’s allegedly fraudulent and for investors disastrous 2011 IPO. On Friday 13th, he ordered Bankia, its parent company BFA, the bank’s former chairman, Rodrigo Rato, its former deputy chairman, José Manuel Olivas, and former Bankia board members Francisco Verdú and José Manuel Fernández to pay an €800 million civil liability bond for signing off on the bank’s 2010 financial statements – financial statements that were included in the IPO brochure and “whose veracity is questioned with solid and well-founded evidence”.
Referring to a report prepared by Bank of Spain inspectors seconded to the court for the investigation, Judge Andreu said:
From the current experts’ report, it can be seen quite clearly that the financial statements contained in the Bankia IPO pamphlet did not represent a true image of the company.
Breaking with Convention
Two months ago, I wrote that Bankia’s saga of lies, deception, and fraud should (but probably won’t) culminate in the imprisonment of Rodrigo Rato, crippling fines for the auditors (Deloitte), and fireworks at financial regulators [Spanish Judge Exposes Too-Big-to-Fail Bank Robbery].
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