Five more UK rate-rigging convictions quashed as SFO prosecutions unravel

By Kirstin Ridley

LONDON, Oct 7 (Reuters) - Five former Barclays traders, jailed in Britain for plotting to rig global benchmark interest rates, won an appeal to clear their names on Wednesday, further unravelling some of the UK Serious Fraud Office's most high-profile prosecutions.

London's Court of Appeal quashed the convictions of Philippe Moryoussef, from France, Kolkata-born Jay Merchant, Britons Colin Bermingham and Jonathan Mathew, and Alex Pabon, an American. 

The traders were cast by prosecutors as a symbol of banker greed at a time of taxpayer fury at eye-watering bank bailouts following the 2007-2009 credit crisis, which sent stock markets plunging and pitched economies into recession.

But the men applied to clear their names after the Supreme Court last year overturned the convictions of Tom Hayes — a former star UBS and Citigroup trader — and ex-Barclays peer Carlo Palombo for rigging now-defunct interbank interest rate Libor and its euro equivalent, Euribor.

The Supreme Court ruled that the trial judges had misdirected juries and that legal errors undermined the fairness of the trials, laying the groundwork for Wednesday's appeals.

"All five convictions were rendered unsafe by the same series of errors ... For those reasons, all five convictions will be quashed," the Court of Appeal said.

TEARFUL TRADER SAYS DECISION HARD TO TAKE IN

Merchant, Pabon, Moryoussef, Bermingham and Mathew were convicted of conspiracy to defraud and sentenced to between 33 months and 8 years in jail between 2016 and 2019 after a series of landmark SFO trials.

"It's hard to take in," said a tearful Bermingham, 70, outside the courtroom. "You don't believe it until you hear it."

Moryoussef, now 58, gained notoriety for jumping bail and fleeing to France. He was tried in London in his absence, sentenced to eight years and has remained a fugitive since.

"Today, I am regaining my soul, and for the first time, I can envision my next chapter in peace," he said in a statement.

Pabon, 48, noted: "Ten years ago, my jury was told, as a matter of law, that an honest answer to the Libor question was not a defence. The Serious Fraud Office now accepts my conviction is unsafe." 

The SFO reiterated that the Supreme Court had found "ample evidence" on which a properly directed jury could have convicted Hayes and Palombo. 

But it added: "After carefully considering this judgment and the full circumstances, we do not oppose the appeals of five individuals convicted by juries in relation to Libor and Euribor."

A further attempted appeal by Christian Bittar, a French former Deutsche Bank trader sentenced to jail in 2018, is expected to be heard on Friday.

Bittar, once dubbed one of the world's most skilled traders, is the only appellant whose case is being contested by the SFO following his guilty plea more than eight years ago.

Designed to estimate the costs at which banks would lend to each other, Libor and Euribor were once a benchmark for interest rates underpinning around $450 trillion of financial contracts, from derivatives to student loans.

(Reporting by Kirstin Ridley; Editing by Tommy Reggiori Wilkes, Iain Withers, Mark Potter and Emelia Sithole-Matarise)