On 27 July 2012 the Financial Times published an article by a former trader who said that the London Interbank Offered Rate or Libor was being fixed by by banks since 1991. Libor is controlled by the British Bankers Association and sets the rates of interest on student loans, mortgages, derivatives and other financial products. Libor underpins $350 trillion of derivatives trades. Banks are supposed to report the actual rates they are paying or expected to pay when trading but either increased or decreased these rates to show higher amounts of profits than they were making. In Britain Chairman of Barclays Bank,Marcus Agius resigned, followed very reluctantly a day later by Bob Diamond, the CEO. Diamond later appeared in front of a parliamentary committee claiming complete ignorance of the scam. Why is it that CEO's take credit for profits and are rewarded with huge bonuses in tens of millions of dollars but claim to know nothing when things go wrong? Why is there no punishment for them and no one goes to jail? When Indian companies borrow money in dollars from banks abroad they promise to pay interest at a certain level higher than Libor. If the interest rate is fixed at 200 basis point above Libor and if Libor is reported at 2% then they will have to pay interest at 4%. However, if Libor rates were being manipulated it is entirely possible that our companies are paying at much higher rates which means India maybe losing billions of dollars in false payments. Is our government interested? No. The Congress is busy using the CBI and other investigative agencies to target the BJP, which it sees as its main opponents at the next elections, while kowtowing to the Prime Minister of China, a nation of uncivilised, barbaric cockroach eaters. Last week European anti-trust authorities raided the offices of 3 oil companies in Europe as well as the offices of Platts which compiles prices for energy markets. The Commission said it had concerns that the companies " may have colluded in reporting distorted prices ". " Even small distortions of assessed prices may have a huge impact on the prices of crude oil, refined products and biofuels purchases and sales, potentially harming final consumers," the Commission said. Since India imports more than $160 billion worth of oil every year even a slight distortion could mean billions of dollars of excess payments increasing our Current Account Deficit. Our credit rating depends partly on CAD and if India is downgraded the cost of borrowing will immediately rise impacting profits of our companies. However, the Congress has always been supine when it comes to our security. We beg for peace with Pakistan even when they send terrorists to kill our citizens and stop buying Iranian oil on US demands even when the US keeps supplying weapons to Pakistan. We are always losing to foreigners.
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