Kweku Adoboli
Born21 May 1980 (1980-05-21) (age 43)
Tema, Greater Accra Region, Ghana
Alma materUniversity of Nottingham
Occupations
Known for2011 UBS rogue trader scandal

Kweku Adoboli (born 21 May 1980) is a Ghanaian investment manager and former stock trader. He was convicted of illegally trading away US$2 billion (£1.3 billion GBP) as a trader for Swiss investment bank UBS. While at the bank he primarily worked on UBS' Global Synthetic Equities Trading team in London, where he engaged in what would later be known as the 2011 UBS rogue trader scandal. After serving a prison sentence, he lost several appeals against the UK Home Office decision to deport him to Ghana.[1]

Early life and education

Kweku Adoboli was born on 21 May 1980 in Tema, Ghana, to John Adoboli, a senior United Nations official.[2][3] He spent his early years in Israel, Syria and Iraq,[4] before moving to the United Kingdom in 1991.[5] He attended Ackworth School in Pontefract, West Yorkshire, where he was head boy.[4] In 2000, after finishing school, he started reading Chemical Engineering at the University of Nottingham, but switched to e-commerce and digital business studies.[4] In 2000, he was elected as Communications Officer of University of Nottingham Students' Union.[3] In mid-2002, he worked as a summer intern at UBS's operations department.[4] He graduated from Nottingham in July 2003.[4]

Career

Adoboli joined UBS's London office as a graduate trainee in September 2003.[2] After working for two years as a trading analyst in the bank's back office, he was promoted to a Delta One trading desk.[4][3][6] In 2008, he became a director on the ETF desk,[4][6] and by 2010 was promoted to director, with a total annual salary of almost £200,000.[4] Beginning in 2008, he started using the bank's money for unauthorised trades.[4] He entered false information into UBS's computers to hide the risky trades he was making.[4][6] He exceeded the bank's per-employee daily trading limit of US$100 million, and failed to hedge his trades against risk.[6] He also used his personal funds on two spread betting accounts, IG Index and City Index, where he lost around £100,000.[4]

In mid-2011, UBS launched an internal investigation into Adoboli's trades.[4] On 14 September 2011, he wrote an email to his manager admitting the false trades,[4][6] which cost the bank $2 billion (£1.3 billion) and wiped off $4.5 billion (£2.7 billion) from its share price.[4] They were the largest unauthorised trading losses in British history.[7]

After his deportation to Ghana, Adoboli hoped to start a new career in finance.[8]

Charges and conviction

On 15 September 2011, Adoboli was arrested by City of London Police[9] and charged with two counts of fraud by abuse of position and four counts of false accounting.[9] He was in prison on remand until 8 June 2012, when he was granted bail subject to being electronically tagged and placed under curfew at a friend's house.[10] On the morning of 20 November 2012, a jury at Southwark Crown Court unanimously found him guilty on one count of fraud. Later that day, after receiving an instruction allowing for a majority decision with a single vote against, the jury found him guilty of a second count of fraud. They found him not guilty on the four false-accounting charges.[6][7] He was sentenced to seven years in prison.[6] The City of London Police said: "This was the UK's biggest fraud, committed by one of the most sophisticated fraudsters the City of London Police has ever come across."[11]

Imprisonment and subsequent appeal against deportation

Adoboli served out his sentence at HMP The Verne in Dorset, HMP Ford in West Sussex, and HMP Maidstone in Kent.[7] He was released in June 2015.[12] Despite living in the United Kingdom since 1991, he had never become a British citizen, and was thus liable for automatic deportation under Section 32 of the UK Borders Act 2007 as a foreign criminal who had been sentenced to at least 12 months of imprisonment.[13] He was served with deportation proceedings in July 2015, and stayed with friends in London and Edinburgh.[14] After his release he gave many talks to students, financial traders and others in the banking industry on operating ethically and avoiding the mistakes he made.[1]

Adoboli lost his original appeal against the Home Secretary's order of deportation made against him in July 2016,[15] and continued to appeal. He was eventually denied permission for a judicial review and his deportation was scheduled for September 2018. He stated that he believed his deportation was due to the Home Office hostile environment policy on immigration.[1] However, Home Office officials stated that their actions, and the underlying decision, were matters of longstanding government policy, supported by the law. Adoboli was deported to his native Ghana on 14 November 2018 after his appeals against deportation were turned down.[16]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c Diane Taylor (19 August 2018). "Former UBS trader Kweku Adoboli vows to fight deportation". The Observer. Archived from the original on 18 August 2018. Retrieved 19 August 2018.
  2. ^ a b Walker, Peter; Hirsch, Afua (20 November 2012). "How Kweku Adoboli's gilded life came crashing down". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 15 August 2015. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
  3. ^ a b c Rayner, Gordon; Hough, Andrew; Evans, Martin (16 September 2011). "From Ghana to the City: the rise of a trader who had it all". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 10 December 2011. Retrieved 15 August 2015.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Dalton, Samantha (20 November 2012). "Kweku Adoboli: From 'rising star' to rogue trader". BBC News. Archived from the original on 10 January 2013. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
  5. ^ Sule, Ahmed (20 November 2011). "Kweku Adoboli: Every 'criminal' is Nigerian, African". Business Day. Business Media Ltd. Archived from the original on 16 November 2012. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g Walker, Peter (20 September 2012). "UBS trader 'risked the very existence of the bank', court told". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 12 June 2015. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
  7. ^ a b c Fortado, Lindsay (24 June 2015). "Rogue trader Kweku Adoboli out of prison". Financial Times. Pearson PLC. Archived from the original on 25 June 2015. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
  8. ^ "After Losing $2.3 Billion at UBS He Now Seeks Redemption in Ghanaian Bonds". Bloomberg.com. 22 January 2020. Archived from the original on 5 January 2021. Retrieved 26 April 2021.
  9. ^ a b Simpson, Emma (20 November 2012). "Kweku Adoboli jailed for fraud over £1.4bn UBS loss". BBC News. Archived from the original on 29 April 2015. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
  10. ^ "UBS 'rogue trader' Kweku Adoboli released on bail in McDonald's car park". The Daily Telegraph. 13 June 2012. Archived from the original on 13 June 2012. Retrieved 17 September 2015.
  11. ^ "Kweku Adoboli jailed for fraud over £1.4bn UBS loss". BBC News. 20 November 2012. Archived from the original on 29 April 2015. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  12. ^ Ruddick, Graham (24 June 2015). "UBS rogue trader Kweku Adoboli released from prison". The Daily Telegraph. London. Archived from the original on 25 September 2015. Retrieved 12 August 2015.
  13. ^ Boland, Hannah (17 August 2018). "Kweku Adoboli at risk of deportation after judicial review denied". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 9 July 2020. Retrieved 9 July 2020.
  14. ^ Fortado, Lindsay (11 October 2015). "Rogue trader Kweku Adoboli fights deportation to Ghana". Financial Times. Pearson PLC. Archived from the original on 12 October 2015. Retrieved 12 October 2015.
  15. ^ "Ex-UBS trader loses deportation appeal". BBC News. 20 July 2016. Archived from the original on 27 November 2017. Retrieved 17 May 2018.
  16. ^ "Ex-UBS trader Kweku Adoboli deported". BBC News. 14 November 2018. Archived from the original on 15 November 2018. Retrieved 14 November 2018.

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