UPDATE 1-Five former traders win right to appeal UK rate-rigging convictions

Alex Pabon, Jay Merchant, Jonathan Mathew, Philippe Moryoussef and Colin Bermingham turned to the ⁠CCRC after former traders Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo succeeded last year in quashing their convictions for manipulating Libor, a now-defunct interbank rate. The CCRC is an independent body that investigates potential miscarriages of justice and can send cases back to the appeal courts ​for further consideration.

Five former traders jailed in Britain for rigging global benchmark interest rates can launch a fresh attempt ‌to overturn their convictions in the country's appeal courts, Britain's Criminal Cases Review Commission said on Thursday. Alex Pabon, Jay Merchant, Jonathan Mathew, Philippe Moryoussef and Colin Bermingham turned to the ⁠CCRC after former traders Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo succeeded last year in quashing their convictions for manipulating Libor, a now-defunct interbank rate.

The CCRC is an independent body that investigates potential miscarriages of justice and can send cases back to the appeal courts ​for further consideration. "After analysing the submissions in all five cases ..., the CCRC has determined there is no distinguishing ‍factor between these cases and the cases of Mr Hayes and Mr Palombo, and the jury misdirection and legal errors have undermined the safety of all the convictions," the CCRC said.

Former New York-based Barclays traders Merchant and Pabon and London-based Mathew were convicted of conspiracy to defraud in 2016 ⁠and handed ‌prison sentences ranging from ⁠two to six-and-a-half years. London-based Moryoussef, who gained notoriety by fleeing to his native France before his London trial, was sentenced to eight years in his ‍absence in 2018 and London-based Bermingham was convicted in 2019 and handed a five-year prison sentence.

Since his conviction was overturned, Hayes - the ​first person jailed for benchmark rate rigging in 2015 - has sued his former employer UBS in the U.S. ⁠for more than $400 million. He alleges the Swiss bank cast him as the "evil mastermind" of the rate-rigging scandal to shield itself, destroying his career and reputation and causing ⁠him emotional and physical harm.

UBS has asked the U.S. court to dismiss the case, noting the bank had to pay $1.5 billion in penalties to UK, Swiss and other regulators, while a Japanese unit pleaded guilty to felony wire fraud, reflecting ⁠the breadth of its investigation and undercutting Hayes' allegations that he was unfairly singled out for prosecution, a filing shows. Designed ⁠to estimate the costs at ‌which banks will lend to each other, benchmark rates such as Libor were central cogs in the global financial system and a benchmark for interest rates on an estimated $450 trillion ⁠of financial contracts, from derivatives to student loans.

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