When the world gets closer.

We help you see farther.

Sign up to our expressly international daily newsletter.

Economy

Sins Of The City: Bankers Caught Red-Handed - Again

Essay: As the Barclays "Libor-gate" financial scandal unravels, France's leading business daily says it's time London lawmakers and City bankers should stop lecturing continental Europe and take a good hard look in the

Really? (EG Focus)
Really? (EG Focus)
François Vidal

PARIS - It's the story of a habitual offender. Once again, finance was caught red-handed, just like the small-time delinquents who promise the judge never to do it again but are unable to control their own impulses. Only a few weeks after JP Morgan's billion dollar trading loss, Barclays is accused of organized fraud on one of the credit market pillars, the Libor.

Barclays, one of the main banks in the City (several other London institutions are also suspected) knowingly helped falsify the interest rate that is the baseline to most commercial transactions and financial products. This is market fraud, and the technical nature of the problem shouldn't hide its importance.

This "Liborgate," which has undoubtedly barely started, is one of the most serious financial scandals since the beginning of this scandal-rich crisis. Even if the financial stake is much lower, it is very similar to the subprime scandal because of what it reveals about the attitude of international finance. A world in which well-established companies can organize institutionalized fraud in order to preserve their interests, in contempt of those of their clients and of society as a whole. It is a universe where the end always justifies the means.

This is also proof that the City, so eager to lecture continental Europe on its banking, should take a look in the mirror. After this scandal, how can you explain to taxpayers who poured billions of pounds, dollars and euros into the financial system that it has learned from its mistakes? That its culture has changed?

Barclays C.E.O Bob Diamond will surely fall, like others did before him. But that won't be enough to fix the broken trust. The financial world has to be brought to heel because it is has no self-discipline. First through much stricter regulation that will incorporate market finance instead of placing it into an incontrollable no-man's land that cuts banks in half. Just as important is strengthened supervision. It is obviously impossible to put a regulator behind each banker. But it is urgent to instill a much deeper fear of regulators in the sector by punishing abuses much more harshly.

Read more from Les Echos in French.

Photo - EG Focus

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

Society

What's Spoiling The Kids: The Big Tech v. Bad Parenting Debate

Without an extended family network, modern parents have sought to raise happy kids in a "hostile" world. It's a tall order, when youngsters absorb the fears (and devices) around them like a sponge.

Image of a kid wearing a blue striped sweater, using an ipad.

Children exposed to technology at a very young age are prominent today.

Julián de Zubiría Samper

-Analysis-

BOGOTÁ — A 2021 report from the United States (the Youth Risk Behavior Survey) found that 42% of the country's high-school students persistently felt sad and 22% had thought about suicide. In other words, almost half of the country's young people are living in despair and a fifth of them have thought about killing themselves.

Such chilling figures are unprecedented in history. Many have suggested that this might be the result of the COVID-19 pandemic, but sadly, we can see depression has deeper causes, and the pandemic merely illustrated its complexity.

I have written before on possible links between severe depression and the time young people spend on social media. But this is just one aspect of the problem. Today, young people suffer frequent and intense emotional crises, and not just for all the hours spent staring at a screen. Another, possibly more important cause may lie in changes to the family composition and authority patterns at home.

Firstly: Families today have fewer members, who communicate less among themselves.

Young people marry at a later age, have fewer children and many opt for personal projects and pets instead of having children. Families are more diverse and flexible. In many countries, the number of children per woman is close to or less than one (Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong among others).

In Colombia, women have on average 1.9 children, compared to 7.6 in 1970. Worldwide, women aged 15 to 49 years have on average 2.4 children, or half the average figure for 1970. The changes are much more pronounced in cities and among middle and upper-income groups.

Of further concern today is the decline in communication time at home, notably between parents and children. This is difficult to quantify, but reasons may include fewer household members, pervasive use of screens, mothers going to work, microwave ovens that have eliminated family cooking and meals and, thanks to new technologies, an increase in time spent on work, even at home. Our society is addicted to work and devotes little time to minors.

Keep reading...Show less

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

The latest