NatWest faces heavy fine after failing to prevent alleged money laundring

NatWest Bank has pleaded guilty to failing to prevent alleged money laundering of nearly £400m by one customer. NatWest said “We deeply regret” failing to “adequately monitor and therefore prevent money laundering by one of our customers between 2012 and 2016”. The case was brought by the Financial Authority (FCA) which alleged the bank failed…

Pandora Papers, financial secrets of global elite exposed

Pandora Papers The latest Pandora papers exposes offshore dealings and secret financial documents of presidents, prime ministers and royalties. Thirty five current and former leaders and more than 300 public officials are featured in the files from offshore companies, dubbed the Pandora Papers.King of Jordan amassed £70m secret UK and US properties empire. Blairs saved…

Financial gulf of generations

Professor Bobby Duffy’s compelling book, reveals our preconceptions are just tired stereotypes by expressing when we’re born determines our attitudes to money, sex, religion, politics, and much else, informed by unique analysis of hundreds of studies. Duffy, formerly of polling company Ipsos Mori, now director of The Policy of Institute at King’s College, London, concludes…

Keep Buggering on

Winston Churchill’s slogan “Keep Buggering On” became a national catchphrase during the Second World War. Duncan Weldon from The Economist highlights key themes from his brisk history of Britain’s economy since the industrial revolution, taking in everything from the South Sea Bubble to the impact of the financial crisis. According to Weldon the same issues…

Antwerp’s golden heydays of fortune and wheels of trade

  In 1940, dealers agents  thronged  the then Netherlands port would enclose price lists for goods or loans on the City’s Exchange, the Beurs, along with correspondence to their clients. Pyke captures the intrigue, opportunity, chaos, scandal and nonconformist spirit of the sixteenth century Antwerp with exquisite narrative zeal. A clerk for van den  Molen…

WeWork made freelancers feel that they were on Google campus

Grifters came to be called visionaries and high finance lost its mind. In 2001, charismatic Adam Neumann arrived in New York, the land of opportunities, after five years as a conscript in the Israeli navy, he transformed himself into the charismatic CEO of WeWork worth $ 47bn, within the span of 15 years. His long…

Maritime power of London amid civil war and plague

Margarette Lincoln, former deputy director of the National Maritime Museum, brings detailed account of London life -the gardens, the coffee houses, the shopping and charts the impact of national events growing citizenry with its love of pageantry, spectacle and enterprise. When the Thames froze  over and Mary Evelyn, wife of the diarist John, complained about…

British Empire Linchpin

Crossing Continents recounts Standard Chartered’s story not a critique of British imperialism, silver crises, and currency reforms but of men and British achievement in the East, with in depth details from one of the richest archives available to any commercial bank, by giving rare and compelling perspective on the evolution of international trade and finance,…