US throws out charges against interest rate ‘rigger’

The US has thrown out criminal charges against former UBS trader Tom Hayes – the first trader to be jailed for “rigging” interest rates. 

Hayes was the first of 38 people to be prosecuted. 

He was charged in both the US and UK, tried in London in 2015 and sentenced to 14 years. It was reduced on appeal to 11 and he severed a total of five and a half years.

But earlier this year, US courts ruled the prosecutions were misconceived. 

It brings an end to a decade-long ordeal facing criminal charges brought to the US Department of Justice. 

But he’s struggling to overturn his conviction in the UK on the same evidence. 

“After years of tireless work by my solicitor Karen Todner, the Department of Justice in the US have now dismissed my charges in their entirety, acknowledging the flawed legal theory pursued in the cases of so-called Libor ‘rigging’,” Mr Hayes said in an exclusive interview with the BBC.

“I am pleased to end the 10-year international pursuit of my legal activity. It is now time for the UK to examine the convictions of all traders. It is now the sole jurisdiction that deems the conduct criminal.”

The US court decided what the traders were accused of did not break any rules or laws, raising questions about the safety of convictions for traders found guilty in nine trials for “rigging” interest rates on both sides of the Atlantic. 

The interest rate traders were accused of manipulating was Libor – the benchmark interest rate that tracks the cost of borrowing cash.