adminLondon. – Barclays Plc is resisting efforts by the UK. Serious Fraud Office to make it disclose documents linked to the bank’s 2008 fundraising the bank says are legally privileged, said three people with knowledge of the matter.
Barclays and London-based Clifford Chance LLP, its adviser on both fundraising from Qatar’s sovereign-wealth fund and the SFO probe, are refusing to hand over evidence tied to the 2008 deal that’s being investigated by the prosecutor, said one of the people, who asked not be identified because the talks are private. Attorney-client privilege prevents the disclosure of some communications between a lawyer and their client.
The SFO opened an investigation in 2012 into 322 million pounds ($525 million) in advisory fees the London-based bank paid the Qatar Investment Authority as it raised 7 billion pounds to escape a taxpayer bailout during the financial crisis.
The SFO, which initially focused its investigation into alleged corruption surrounding the deal, has since shifted its focus to whether the bank and executives made false and misleading statements in relation to its duty as a public company, one of the people said.
The agency has asked some board members from the time of the deal to be interviewed as witnesses, the person said. The UK prosecutor has previously interviewed a number of former senior Barclays executives, including former chief executive officer John Varley and former chief financial officer Chris Lucas, as part of the probe. Former CEO Robert Diamond was also called for questioning.
‘Transcend Extravagance’
Nilima Fox, a spokeswoman for the SFO, Anna Richards, a spokeswoman for Clifford Chance, and Giles Croot, a London-based spokesman for Barclays, declined to comment. The Financial Times reported the interviews with the board members and the change of focus in the investigation yesterday.
SFO director David Green has spoken about the investigative problems the agency faces regarding claims of legal privilege on material he believes doesn’t fall into that category. Claims of privilege “can transcend extravagance and amount to a strategy of deliberate obstruction, a strategy we will always challenge,” he said at a conference on economic crime in Cambridge, England, earlier this month.
The SFO is unlikely to decide on any charges against individuals or the bank this year, according to three people with knowledge of the matter. The UK Financial Conduct Authority, Britain’s markets regulator, has also notified the bank it plans to levy a 50 million-pound fine over the matter. – Bloomberg.
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