RBS report by FSA a total whitewash

Adair Turner tells a story about bankers

The Financial Services Authority is a joke. They've spent months doing a report into the shinanigans at RBS and now conclude that the collapse was all due to poor decisions. Not poor enough for heads to roll. Adair Turner, the chief at the FSA has been on TV spinning a line. But this collapse was not about poor decisions, it was ALL ABOUT Fred Goodwin and other directors becoming too big for their boots. In the BBC2 programme on this collapse and public bailout, we see Sir Fred happily saying that he never bothered much with due diligence when taking over NatWest. It was "due diligence light" rather like some heady cocktail with Diet Coke in it. He then boasted that the same happened at ABN Amro, the Dutch bank that was a can of worms. Due diligence light and toxic loan heavy. Adair Turner just waffles on about the FSA being "flawed" in its own supervision and that it "provided insufficient challenge" to RBS. We knew that before he put pen to paper!

None of this will ever get better until the whole financial services industry is giving a good cleaning from top to toe. After all, as a complete shower they need a complete shower!

Posted in: due diligence,Financial Services Authority,Royal Bank of Scotland,Sir Fred Goodwin