Markets Live chat transcript for the chat ending at 10:47 on 13 Apr 2010. Participants in this chat were: Neil Hume, FT Bryce Elder
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good morning
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hola
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etc
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it’s 11.03am
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and time for Markets Live
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FT Alphaville’s daily meander round the markets
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with Bryce Elder from the London markets team
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and me
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Hello.
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and so
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after a slow start
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after a slow start
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we now have a few things to talk about
11:16AM
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Right
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You’ve probably noticed that we’ve had a complete technology meltdown at One Southwark Bridge
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No internet whatsoever
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I’ve managed to jump in via the Bloomberg machine, which is on a different connection
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And Neil’s struggling to hook up a laptop using one of those 3G dongle thingmybobs
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TFT1 – the zapper still works
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Trying to decide whether to leave the session ticking or close it down and return when we get things running again
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Providing you all behave yourselves on the right, we should be able to do the latter
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Neil’s now on the phone to IT
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“a couple of minutes” apparently
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So, that’s now on public record. Let’s see how it compares to the truth ….
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Apologies – still no signs of life
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hedgesparrow – we don’t know. We’re not involved on the data side
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Despite getting calls almost daily from blustery retired majors voicing similar complaints
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Hang on – we may be back!
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They’ve brought in a new hamster to power the wheel
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Normal service resumes
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I’m back
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final
11:29AM
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the system is working again
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not sure what happened
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and neither are IT
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but the important this is
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we are up and running again
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the outage good for comments though
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flooding in
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obviously much more fun
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Gets the numbers up, yes
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chatting among themselves
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than listening to us
11:30AM
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Right Lorcan
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wants to start with a little bit of Northern Crock
Readers may also know this former bank as Northern Rock.
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and why not
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Sure
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This morning’s muscle flexing from the World’s Toughest Regulator
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this came out, just before the IT meltdown
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FSA fines and bans former Northern Rock deputy chief executive and credit director for misreporting mortgage arrears figures
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has today fined David Baker, former deputy chief executive of Northern Rock Plc (NR), £504,000 and Richard Barclay, former managing credit director at NR, £140,000.
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Baker has also been prohibited from performing any function in relation to any regulated activity. And Barclay has been prohibited from performing any significant influence function at an FSA-regulated firm.
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wow
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half a million pound fine
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what did he do to deserve that?
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Hold on – it explains.
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Despite becoming aware in January 2007 that there were 1,917 loans omitted from the mortgage arrears figures, Baker failed to escalate the information internally and agreed a course of action which resulted in the loans not being reported.
He also made misleading statements regarding these impaired loans to external stakeholders, including market analysts, quoting inaccurate figures. If the 1,917 loans had been reported as being in arrears, the figures would have increased by approximately 50%. Alternatively if the loans had been reported as in possession, the number would have increased from 662 to 2,579 cases.
He also made misleading statements regarding these impaired loans to external stakeholders, including market analysts, quoting inaccurate figures. If the 1,917 loans had been reported as being in arrears, the figures would have increased by approximately 50%. Alternatively if the loans had been reported as in possession, the number would have increased from 662 to 2,579 cases.
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Despite becoming aware in January 2007 that there were 1,917 loans omitted from the mortgage arrears figures, Baker failed to escalate the information internally and agreed a course of action which resulted in the loans not being reported.
He also made misleading statements regarding these impaired loans to external stakeholders, including market analysts, quoting inaccurate figures. If the 1,917 loans had been reported as being in arrears, the figures would have increased by approximately 50%. Alternatively if the loans had been reported as in possession, the number would have increased from 662 to 2,579 cases.
He also made misleading statements regarding these impaired loans to external stakeholders, including market analysts, quoting inaccurate figures. If the 1,917 loans had been reported as being in arrears, the figures would have increased by approximately 50%. Alternatively if the loans had been reported as in possession, the number would have increased from 662 to 2,579 cases.
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Ah
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I see
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Looks like we have lost Bryce again
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he made the mistake of trying to refresh
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so I will soldier on
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if you want to read more on this
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the final notices for the two former Crock directors
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can be found here
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and here
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and as Lorcan notes
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it is certainly a day for washing dirty linen
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the stuff out of Iceland
11:39AM
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Right
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So we’ve gone again
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“network problem”
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Which is something of an understatement from our ever-brilliant IT department
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Is Praxis22 here? You sound like you know what you’re talking about. Want a job?
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Anyway – Neil wants to keep the session running until at least midday in case we ever get back in
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I’m minded to switch off
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We would, of course, very much like to touch on the various subjects raised by the ROTR. DSGi and so on
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But it’s just me, at the wrong side of the office, using IE6 on a Bloomberg machine
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Which is not ideal.
11:44AM
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An executive decision has been made
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We’re shutting this session
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Which is perhaps the least informative in ML history
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We * might * return later
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So keep your eye on the main blog for updates
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That’s assuming we’re ever able to access the main blog
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Tuna: your entry fee will be refunded in full.
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Just send us an SAE and a tenner to cover the processing costs.
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And on that note, good afternoon.
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Thanks for all your comments, and apologies again for our lack of them
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Bye