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"Let's Take Them On!": Libor E-mails Of Christian Bittar Revealed

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Back in 2012 we introduced readers to Christian Bittar, a former prop trader at Deutsche Bank who profited handsomely by betting on the direction of rates he conspired with others to manipulate (recall that when it comes to betting on the direction of rates, it’s much easier to make winning trades when you collude with colleagues to fix the benchmark). Readers may also recall that via a bit of digging which began with the LinkedIn profile of someone else named Christian Bittar, we were soon tossed down the Lieborgate rabbit hole only to find that on the other end was the secretive world of Swiss hedge funds and private banks. 

We later detailed how Deutsche Bank went about ridding itself of Bittar who was once one of the firm’s most well-paid traders and concluded with the following six point assessment:

  1. Deutsche tells an internal prop trader to invest billions in the Libor market,but tells him: "do everything legally and by the book or else."
  2. Bittar colludes with virtually everyone else under the sun to generate billions in profits;
  3. Bittar makes tens if not hundreds of millions of bonuses for himself;
  4. Finally, DB no longer can hide the deception and claws back a portion of Bittar's bonuses, while washing its hands of the full affair;
  5. Scapegoat punished, life goes on.
  6. He went to work for Bluecrest Capital Management LLP, Europe’s third- biggest hedge fund with $30 billion under management.

Fast forward a few years and Deutsche Bank has just been saddled with a $2.5 billion fine for its contribution to the worldwide manipulation of benchmark rates and thanks to the now-public e-mails used by the Justice Department to make its case, we know exactly what Christian said on the way to influencing the fixings. Here’s Bloomberg

Identified only as Trader Three by the U.S. Department of Justice, he was Deutsche Bank’s most profitable derivatives trader, earning a bonus of almost 90 million pounds ($136 million) in 2008 alone. He was responsible for the majority of the requests for skewed Euribor submissions, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission said Thursday.

 

That trader is Christian Bittar, according to two people with knowledge of the situation, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly…

 

Trader Three worked in concert with colleagues in Frankfurt and as many as six counterparts at other firms, seeking to manipulate the rate to boost the profitability of his positions, according to the Justice Department. Sometimes he allegedly worked against the interests of others at his own firm if it benefited his trading book.

 

“My cash desk will be against us so we’ll have to do some lobbying,” he told a derivatives dealer at a rival bank in a Sept. 7, 2006, message released by the Justice Department. He noted Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc and UBS Group AG also were likely to be “against” and promised to contact a trader at an additional firm.

 

“ok we have to fight hard,” the rival bank dealer replied.

 

Trader Three’s relationship with his counterpart at that bank didn’t stop him from on occasion submitting rates that would hurt it.

 

“LETS TAKE THEM ON !!” he said in a Sept. 21, 2005, message to an rate-submitter at Deutsche Bank, according to the bank’s settlement with the New York Department of Financial Services, which described Bittar by his title. The rival bank “IS DOIN IT ON PURPOSE BECAUSE THEY HAVE THE EXACT OPPOSITE POSITION.”

 

“Ok, let’s see if we can hurt them a little bit more then,” the submitter replied.

*  *  *

Nothing wrong with that. Just a couple of friends conspiring to manipulate the benchmark rates on which trillions in mortgages and nearly every other kind of loan imaginable are based for personal gain.

If only someone had warned the world about this more than six years ago

 

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Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:34 | 6027717 williambanzai7
williambanzai7's picture

Trader Three is not behind bars.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:34 | 6027722 AIIB
AIIB's picture

Trader 3 = Logan 5

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:38 | 6027732 williambanzai7
williambanzai7's picture

f

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:47 | 6027749 ZerOhead
ZerOhead's picture

Behind every Great Fortune lies an even Greater Crime....

                                ~ Somebody at DB

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:48 | 6027760 AIIB
AIIB's picture

Behing every good .gif there are titties flying out, but I didn't see any here :-(

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:59 | 6027790 whotookmyalias
whotookmyalias's picture

<----------No way, this guy is a scapegoat

<----------Yes I totally believe this was the work of a single person.  

 

 

Either way it's fucked.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 18:17 | 6027992 jefferson32
jefferson32's picture

Bravo Zerohedge, you are in the early 21st century what the New York Times was in the early 20th. Sic semper tyrannis!

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 19:06 | 6028094 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

Seems like the trends are "Lets Bust Some Balls" so they don't pick up their pitch forks and hunt us all down like the dogs we are...

Make a good show of thing until everything is all quite again....

Ninja Bankers, stealing the futures of children for centuries. ©™®

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 23:01 | 6028608 Gent
Gent's picture

Oh man...this is exactly how I imagine my joy ride to the other side with the Reaper will be, except he won't face plant the deck like that nimrod...lulz

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:45 | 6027753 Squid Viscous
Squid Viscous's picture

that's what shorting anything felt like this week...

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:47 | 6027756 Seasmoke
Seasmoke's picture

That's just awesome. 

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:32 | 6027870 NoDebt
NoDebt's picture

Here's the full video with sound:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BB5LXF0c__g

Or just look for "7 person boat crash" on YouTube.  I love how the driver goes down like a sack of potatos.  "I'm standing... I'm standing... I'm face-down on the deck.  How'd that happen?"

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:52 | 6027769 falak pema
falak pema's picture

this is what happens to Yanis when he goes and visits Mutti ! 

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:53 | 6027775 sgt_doom
Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:57 | 6027939 knukles
knukles's picture

What's a book?  Oh a match book.  Yeah, I can get about half way through the cover.  Phew!  Thought I was missing ....
Look!!!!!  A shiny unicorn!  Quick, look!  Get a pic for FaceBook! 

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 22:50 | 6028573 capital one
capital one's picture

I freelance over th? internet and earn about 80-85$ an hour. I was without a job for 7 months but last month my paycheck with big fat bonus was $15000 just working on my computer from my home for 5-6 hours. Here's what i have been doing... www.globe-report.com

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:33 | 6027718 AIIB
AIIB's picture

I'm shocked to see there's gambling on in this casino

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:37 | 6027728 Chuck Knoblauch
Chuck Knoblauch's picture

Where is my fresh sushi?

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:40 | 6027738 Kaiser Sousa
Kaiser Sousa's picture

KILL THEM...

KILL THEM ALL!

 

 

death to the MoneyChangers.......

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 19:08 | 6028101 MonetaryApostate
MonetaryApostate's picture

The Fall Enslaves Us All...

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:46 | 6027746 falak pema
falak pema's picture

To go back to the timeline of the global  Casino players we have to visit Singapore and the man who brought down Barings, the Queen's bank, and his name was : Nick Leeson in 1995 and he started this derivative scam game rolling all over the globe; Jerome Kerviel, Fabrice Tourre, Bruno Iksil, then all those Libor scammers, Corzine, and now the HFT wizard Nav Sarao...

All these fall guys for the JPMs and Citis of this world likes the POPEs of old; the TBTF that we cannot nail to the wall like the 95 theses of Martin Luther's reform.

History rhymes big time! 

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 18:03 | 6027958 knukles
knukles's picture

Elegant linkage to the Dispensation of Indulgences.
The Immortality of Evil and Sin

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:45 | 6027754 Condition 1SQ
Condition 1SQ's picture

Would it kill you fucking people to do something productive with your lives rather than rig the markets?  Fucking lunatics.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:56 | 6027781 sgt_doom
sgt_doom's picture

Man oh man --- after that remark Old John D. Rockefeller, JP Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, Jay Gould, Andrew Mellon and all the du Ponts are rolling in their graves, or laughing in Hell!

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 16:51 | 6027767 Weaponized Innocense
Weaponized Innocense's picture

Tyler
I left a message way back then just now which links back to here.
Needs to be approved.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:33 | 6027806 I need more asshats
I need more asshats's picture

“Ok, let’s see if we can hurt them a little bit more then,”

I dunno but this may be a hate crime? Were there any "people of color" in the opposite bank? You know, victims? If I were a PI lawyer I'd be all over this.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 19:30 | 6028158 Pure Evil
Pure Evil's picture

If you can't get em for hate crimes he's at least guilty of a microaggression.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:30 | 6027874 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

Okay, new office betting pool:

1) How much Holder will be "earning" in the connected-sector.
2) Who in the connected-sector he'll end up "working" for.

My bets: $1.1 million a year, and "working" for JP Morgan.

Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.

 

Look up treasonous pol Chris Dodd for a benchmark.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 18:07 | 6027967 knukles
knukles's picture

Little Chrissie Pooh made out like a bandito while in office.  Had rather preferential loans from Mozillo et al for places like evidently stupendous private residence in Ireland.  Y'all know.....  Minor shit on a congresscrittwer's salary, let alone moving money offshore.  Not to mention the time he ran for Prez, but essentially ran only in the state of CT, drawing massive "campaign contributions" out of the financial base (read humongoliod insurance companies) around Hartford, etc.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:17 | 6027844 scatha
scatha's picture

Remember they did it only to make their fat bosses happy and bribes, to look away for SEC guys, coming.

The prophetic words about “free” markets written just few months ago

excerpt:

It would be superfluous to add that strong buyers and strong sellers are those who run real marketplaces and making all the profit using all visible hands, often armed with guns, [smart phone] or government connections. What’s left “free” in real market is nosebleed or worse for those who demand honesty and fairness.

I found at:

https://contrarianopinion.wordpress.com/2015/01/29/invisible-hand-and-other-paranoid-delusions/

 

 

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:23 | 6027860 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

Guillotines for banksters.

Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:30 | 6027875 wmbz
wmbz's picture

Get caught stealing a cookie three times in a row from a store and that's 3 strikes you're out, because you are a hungry moron and it's prison for a serf.

Banksters Inc. owns the world ....Ma.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 19:45 | 6028193 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

"Banksters Inc. owns the world ....Ma."

But only renting their heads.

Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.

Fri, 04/24/2015 - 17:51 | 6027927 Amy G. Dala
Amy G. Dala's picture

Maybe we can send Captain Willard up river, to terminate the Colonel Kurtz' command.  Up river all by himself, operating with no sense of human decency, making himself out as some sort of god.  Terminate with extreme prejudice.

Sat, 04/25/2015 - 02:44 | 6028803 Schmuck Raker
Schmuck Raker's picture

I will start by apologizing to anybody i actually respect even as i hope to shit all over everybody including you for, ...er..... um.

Sat, 04/25/2015 - 02:45 | 6028804 Schmuck Raker
Schmuck Raker's picture

KUVO

Sat, 04/25/2015 - 02:47 | 6028808 Schmuck Raker
Schmuck Raker's picture

FUCK CHRISTIANS. fuck you bernanke.

Sun, 04/26/2015 - 11:38 | 6031252 eishund
eishund's picture

Of what use is money in the hand of a fool, since he has no desire to get wisdom?

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