Three former managers of Barclays Portugal, including its former President Peter Mottek, have been reinstated after an internal investigation conducted by the British parent company found them innocent of involvement in market rigging.
The problem Barclays now faces is that their high-flying employees’ jobs have been given to other people. The three can expect generous pay-offs funded by a red-faced Barclays in the UK.
Peter Mottek, the former chairman of Barclays Portugal, former financial manager Ana Paula Alves, and António Nunes da Silva who was responsible for Barclays’ commercial business were reinstated after their acquittal following an internal investigation. There is no news of Spaniard Sérgio Muñoz who was suspended at the same time as the others.
The managers had been suspended since April 2013 last year and now are not expected to be turning up for work anytime soon as their seats have been filled. Barclays in Lisbon will not comment but the termination of their contracts is the most probable outcome.
The three were suspended as part of an investigation into an alleged cartel among Portuguese banks for their mortgage and loans business, an investigation which is still in progress by the Portuguese authorities.
The Barclays’ CEO in London, Antony Jenkins, in March 2013 ordered a global audit to all of the bank’s operations after allegations of cartel activity regarding spreads and commissions among Portugal’s leading banks including his Barcalys outpost.
The same suspicions lead the authorities to search more than a dozen Portuguese banks accused of operating a cartel.
The suspended Barcalys’ staff had their email and mobile phone accounts suspended and the management of Barclays Portugal was transferred to Madrid under Jaime Echegoyen, the then joint Chief Executive of Barclays’ Iberian operations with Mottek.
After nine months of management from Madrid, Barclays Iberia was passed to Claudio Corradini to run, who until January 2014 had been in charge of Barclays branches in Italy.
The acquittal of the three by Barcaly's in the UK does not mean the Portuguese authorities will follow the same path nor come to the same conclusion.
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