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Plugging the leaks

06 September 2007 / Richard Burger
Issue: 7287 / Categories: Features , Banking , Commercial
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What can be done to clean up the UK’s money markets? Richard Burger reports

In the film Wall Street the US stockbroker Bud Fox impersonates the supervisor of a team of night-time cleaners to break into the law offices of a former college buddy to steal information about a pending merger and acquisition (M&A). Fox is, of course, a character of fiction, but such is the value of inside information that the UK market has seen its own breed of insider, for example Asif Butt, who in 2005 was convicted and imprisoned for insider dealing based on information he leaked from his role as compliance officer with a leading investment bank.

The City and its regulator, the Financial Services Authority (FSA), are aware that insider dealing and market abuse exists. On 2 July 2007 the FSA published the findings of its Thematic Review of Controls over Inside Information relating to Public Takeovers.

TRADING AND TAKEOVERS

The catalyst for the review was the FSA’s earlier work to measure the cleanliness of the UK markets.

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NEWS
Ceri Morgan, knowledge counsel at Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer LLP, analyses the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Johnson v FirstRand Bank Ltd, which reshapes the law of fiduciary relationships and common law bribery
The boundaries of media access in family law are scrutinised by Nicholas Dobson in NLJ this week
Reflecting on personal experience, Professor Graham Zellick KC, Senior Master of the Bench and former Reader of the Middle Temple, questions the unchecked power of parliamentary privilege
Geoff Dover, managing director at Heirloom Fair Legal, sets out a blueprint for ethical litigation funding in the wake of high-profile law firm collapses
James Grice, head of innovation and AI at Lawfront, explores how artificial intelligence is transforming the legal sector
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