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Posted on 9 Jan 2012 by ForagerI shouldn't be shocked. But seriously, is this Philipp Hildebrand stuff for real? I had to read this little snippet out of The Economist twice:
The Swiss National Bank published its internal regulations on staff transactions to try to dampen allegations swirling in the Swiss media that Philipp Hildebrand, the central bank's president, and his wife acted wrongly by buying dollars prior to the SNB setting a ceiling for the Swiss franc last year. The SNB also published the results of an investigation into the trades, which found that the transactions did not breach SNB rules [my emphasis].
It turns out that because Hildebrand's wife did the trade, two days before the SNB started intervening to push the Swiss franc down, and Hildebrand didn't know about it, he's done nothing wrong. The investigation didn't say anything about whether his wife knew about the imminent intervention.
What hope is there that investment bankers will behave themselves when the public servants are front running, insider trading and using exactly the same legalistic, unethical arguments to justify their behaviour? It makes me sick.
