Libor traders sentenced to prison

Four former Barclays (BARC.L) bankers were sentenced to between 33 months and six-and-a-half years in jail by a London judge on Thursday for conspiring to rig global benchmark interest rates.

A jury found Jonathan James Mathew, 35, of Shenfield, Essex, Jay Vijay Merchant, 45, and Alex Pabon, 37, who both live in the United States, guilty of manipulating the USA dollar Libor rate between 2005 and 2007.

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The four manipulated the London interbank offered rate, or Libor, between 2005 and 2007.

The bankers had argued that they should not be found guilty because they did not know they were behaving dishonestly and so did not meet the legal definition of fraud.

He admitted the charge in 2014 and did not stand trial with the others. This was the third case to be brought by the SFO into Libor manipulation.

He was ordered to pay back £114,501 and to pay £30,000 costs but was praised by the judge for his early guilty plea.

Judge Anthony Leonard will sentence the men at Southwark Crown Court later. A total of four former Barclays’ traders were consequently slapped with prison sentences for their involvement in the scandal, which continues to result in harsh penalties for financial wrongdoing. But, he said, he didn’t agree with arguments he should show leniency because of the many traders involved that haven’t been prosecuted and the shorter prison sentences handed out for the behavior in the U.S. The men, who were mostly dressed in jeans and t-shirts, were led out of the court by three security guards immediately after the hearing.

The SFO had two weeks in which to seek a retrial.

The verdicts come four years after Barclays received a hefty fine over rate-fixing.