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Barclays’ Diamond Criticizes Bonus Tax, Sees Regulator Missteps
Jefferies Hires Four Equity Analysts to Cover Health-Care Stocks

Barclays’ Diamond Criticizes Bonus Tax, Sees Regulator Missteps

Source: Bloomberg; December 8, 2009  - Barclays Plc President Robert Diamond said plans to impose a windfall tax on bankers’ bonuses are unwarranted, and that the U.K. risks regulatory missteps that would put London at a competitive disadvantage. “It’s very important to recognize the importance that major financial centers are balanced in terms of regulatory efforts around capital, around accounting, and around compensation,” Diamond said at a conference in Horsham, England, today organized by the Wall Street Journal. “During this period of regulatory reform we really need to make it a race to the top, not a race to the bottom.” The tax proposal “isn’t supported by the principles we adopted” in response to the financial crisis, said Diamond, who oversees the London-based lender’s investment banking division. In a question to opposition Conservative party leader David Cameron, Diamond said that he was worried that the U.K. may take “missteps” that would put London at a disadvantage to New York as a financial center. Politicians are seeking to mollify angry voters after the British government provided more than 1 trillion pounds ($1.63 trillion) to prop up lenders including Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc. Barclays, Britain’s second-biggest bank, avoided taking taxpayer money. Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling is considering a levy on bankers’ bonuses before next year’s election. Darling told bankers at his official residence in London yesterday that he will do nothing to harm the U.K. capital’s competitiveness in finance.
Leaders from the Group of 20 nations agreed at their September summit in Pittsburgh to adopt guidelines restricting the amount banks can devote to their bonus pools and requiring payments to be deferred and subject to clawbacks. Barclays “quickly adopted and willingly adopted” the G-20 principles around compensation, Diamond said today.
Diamond said banks and proprietary trading are not “socially useless,” responding to criticism of the industry from Financial Services Authority Chairman Adair Turner.
Pension funds “need banks to help take out risks because they have liabilities that need to be paid out” as interest rates fall to near zero, Diamond said. “There is a real purpose for structuring credit risk for pension funds, for example. We shouldn’t assume that all derivatives are bad.” Turner proposed in August a global tax on bank transactions, saying that some banks’ activities weren’t “socially useful.” That term is “unfortunate” and “not based on facts,” Diamond said today.

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Jefferies Hires Four Equity Analysts to Cover Health-Care Stocks

Source: Bloomberg; December 8, 2009  - Jefferies Group Inc. hired four equity analysts to cover the health-care industry, according to a statement distributed today.

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