The Bank That Failed Because of a Fax Machine
In 1995, Barings Bank—Britain's oldest merchant bank—collapsed because a single trader in Singapore hid catastrophic losses in a secret account he controlled from both the trading and settlement sides. This is the story of how one man's unchecked authority and a few concealed slips of paper toppled a 233-year-old institution that had financed the Napoleonic Wars.
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Nick Leeson hid massive losses by controlling both the trading floor and the back-office settlement process.
Account eighty-eight thousand eight hundred eighty-eight served as a secret parking spot for unauthorized trading debt.
Fragmented fax-based workflows and thermal paper reports allowed critical risk signals to be ignored by leadership.
The nineteen ninety-five Kobe earthquake triggered a market crash that exposed Leeson's leveraged positions.
Barings Bank collapsed after hidden losses reached eight hundred twenty-seven million pounds, exceeding its total capital.
London management funded massive cash requests without verifying market positions because of Leeson's reported profits.
- 01Intro1 min
- 02The Five Eights2 min
- 03The Fatal Overlap3 min
- 04The Paper Trail and the Earthquake3 min
- 05The Final Tally2 min
- 06Outro1 min
- Barings Bank - Wikipedia
- How Nick Leeson brought down Barings Bank at the age of just 28
- Bankruptcy of Barings Bank (1995) | Description, Nick Leeson, & Facts
- Collapse of Barings - Singapore - NLB
- Account 88888: The Report That Predicted the Collapse of Barings Bank
- Barings Bank: The 230 year old empire
- Barings Bank
- Promoting Confidence and Stability in Financial Markets: Capitalizing on the Downfall of Barings
- The Barings Bank Collapse: How Bad Business Decisions ...
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