UBS 'rogue trader' Adoboli pleads not guilty

30 January 2012 | 4078 views | 3 UBS web screen shot

Kweku Adoboli, the UBS trader who is accused of racking up losses of $2.3 billion through unathorised trading activity at the Swiss bank, has pleaded not guilty to charges of fraud and false accounting at a court hearing in London.

Adoboli has been held in custody since the losses on the bank's Delta One trading desk were uncovered in September. The subsequent scandal led to the departure of UBS chief Oswald Gruebel and the co-heads of the Swiss bank's global equities business.

Upon his arrest Adoboli admitted that he had masked his losses through the creation of fictitous positions on other accounts. An internal investigation by the bank eventually discovered failings in internal controls and risk systems that allowed the trades to take place.

A weekend report in the Wall Street Journal says that UK and Swiss regulators are conducting their own investigations and may penalise the bank for serious shortfalls in systems and oversight of its dealing activity.

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A Finextra member | 30 January, 2012, 16:20

UBS 'rogue trader' Adoboli pleads not guilty ... How did the risk department plead?

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David Millar - DXL Partners - London | 31 January, 2012, 08:10

No way Adoboli could do this on his own and fool his bosses, colleagues, risk and audit - he is no genius. But now, in pleading not guilty, it appears he is not prepared to be the scapegoat. It will be interesting to see what his defence is. It will be in UBS's interest to portray this as a single rogue trader incident whatever the consequence in regulatory fines, rather than admit others were involved.

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A Finextra member | 31 January, 2012, 09:05

Aoboli, isn't alone by the looks of things. After he was nabbed, several other members of his trading desk and the management directly above him resigned.

It appears is often the case, that the rogue trading event at UBS wasn't isolated to a single instance of malpractice.

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