In 2008, the biggest banks in the Western world were being bailed out by their governments. Barclays, however, raised billions of dollars on its own to fortify its balance sheet and sidestep the inconvenience of having its executives’ compensation and bankers’ bonus pools subject to regulatory dictates.
Now it turns out that not everything was what it seemed.
Barclays Plc. (NYSE:BCS), the holding company that controls Barclays Bank Plc. (NYSE:BCS-PD), and four former top Barclays executives have been charged with fraud relating to how they raised the money that saved the bank and their paychecks from government oversight.
Whether they were just trying to save taxpayers money or their compensation packages will now be determined in criminal court.
But in the court of public opinion, the verdict’s already being tallied.
Get caught up on what they did and how, and then cast your vote here…