Of the almost 36,000 words laid out over 83 pages in the UK Supreme Court’s July 23rd 2025 judgment following Tom Hayes’ ( ex-UBS/Citigroup ) and Carlo Palombo’s ( ex-Barclays ) appeal hearing over their Libor convictions, the only ones that mattered came amid the single-sentence conclusion on page 73: “I allow both appeals and quash the appellants’ convictions”.

Equally significant was the Serious Fraud Office’s response: “We have considered this judgment and the full circumstances carefully and determined it would not be in the public interest for us to seek a retrial”. And the Financial Conduct Authority’s communication two days later: Palombo’s ban from the financial services industry revoked. Actions against Hayes ended. No further action to be taken against either individual.

Almost 10 years ago to the day, I wrote an opinion piece about Tom Hayes’ Libor conviction, then just days old. I called it politically motivated. I called it a travesty. I wrote that his penalty was Draconian and ruthless, that the conviction was malicious and unsafe. I referred to the prosecutions as a smug and conceited play to the gallery of anti-banker sentiment and depressingly consistent with the prejudice and lust for revenge emanating from the public policy machine since the financial crisis.

I stand by those words. I am delighted with this turn of events, albeit it was a decade coming and came on a critical legal technicality. Individuals were relentlessly pursued and mercilessly scapegoated by the UK political, regulatory and judicial establishment – and their employers – in shabby show trials.

The entire Libor episode has been an epic scandal. A scandal not from the perspective of traders and submitters but from the UK political, judicial and regulatory perspectives. I wholeheartedly and unconditionally support long-standing calls for a public enquiry. Now that Hayes and Palombo’s convictions have been overturned is the right time to start to bring to public attention:

• How evidence was gathered
• How evidence was shared between prosecution and defence
• How the cases were conducted
• The role of the UK Serious Fraud Office as investigator and prosecutor
• Why only a few mid-ranking and junior individuals were charged but not a single senior manager at any bank was ever charged
• The appropriateness of the wrecking ball of ‘conspiracy to defraud’ to pursue individuals
• How judges were able to cut off defence strategies and misdirect juries
• Whether the Bank of England directed banks to lowball.

Putting on public record the latter point is vital, that is, making transparent whether senior officials at the Bank of England directly instructed senior UK bankers to low-ball Libor at the time of the global financial crisis in order to mislead the global entire financial market into believing that UK banks were in a stronger position than they actually were.

On the point about judge misdirection, this line in the Supreme Court judgment was a killer: “It was wrong for the judge to direct the jury that, if the submitter took any account of the commercial interests of the bank or a trader, the rate submitted was for that reason not a genuine or honest answer to the question posed by the definitions as a matter of law.” Touché.

Poor conviction record

As well as Hayes and Palombo, I’ve tracked a further 53 cases off and on, involving cash and derivatives traders, Libor submitters and individuals laterally involved who were cited in the UK or US for attempting to manipulate US dollar or yen Libor or Euribor.

From what I can work out, 17 of those accused were never charged, 17 were acquitted at trial or on appeal; four had their European arrest warrants withdrawn; three had charges dropped, and I couldn’t find where one case got to ( except that it didn’t end in conviction ). That leaves 11 convictions, in addition to Hayes and Palombo. Beyond those formally charged or named, a lot more were fired under the radar.

Of the 13 convictions, two individuals served no time because of plea deals. Eleven served time in prison. But that’s 11 too many in the circumstances. I understand many of those convicted are urgently seeking to have their convictions overturned. In the UK, this means applying to the Criminal Cases Review Commission to have cases referred back to the Court of Appeal.

This will presumably be much quicker now that Hayes and Palombo have been exonerated; that the notion of there being just one correct Libor rate at which a prime bank could borrow in size in the interbank market at 11am on a given day has been seen to have been dangerously fallacious and misguided; and that the practice of high or low-balling was not necessarily illegal.

Standard practice

Gathering a range of levels for Libor submissions was part and parcel of the daily routine at banks. Senior managers knew about it, encouraged it or dictated it. Messages, emails or spreadsheets were openly sent around various departments at submitting banks to gather the range. As the Supreme Court judgment noted, just because it may have benefited a bank’s trading positions doesn’t necessarily make it a wrong submission.

There was no evidence that actual Libor rates were actually altered. There were no named victims. It has been seen to have been wrong to automatically assume that massaging Libor submissions was even dishonest, let alone criminal.

If convictions are overturned, individuals should receive compensation on top of repayment of funds wrongly designated as ‘proceeds of crime’.

Final question: should the banks have their hefty fines repaid?