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UK banking ban for former RBS boss Johnny Cameron

Pa
Tuesday 18 May 2010 12:27 EDT
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The former boss of Royal Bank of Scotland's investment banking business has been banned from ever holding a senior role in the City again, it was announced today.

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) said Johnny Cameron had agreed to the decision following an investigation into systems and controls in the global markets division at RBS, launched in the wake of the bank's near collapse and subsequent taxpayer bail-out.

Mr Cameron will not face a fine as a result of his settlement, but will never be able to hold another top job in the City or full-time role in the UK financial services industry.

Mr Cameron, who is in his mid-fifties, was previously chairman of global markets at RBS, heading the bank's doomed investment banking division that was largely responsible for landing RBS with many billions of pounds of bad debts.

The FSA said it had not found Mr Cameron guilty of any regulatory breaches and he had not made any admissions.

It did not disclose the details behind his ban, but said "on the basis of the information available to it, the FSA believes that Cameron would not meet its current standards for approval for a significant influence function".

Anyone who wants to work in a senior role in the City must have approval from the FSA, which decides if they are "fit and proper" for the function they wish to fulfil.

Mr Cameron will not be stopped from taking on part-time consultancy work in the financial services sector.

The ex-RBS banking chief has already been blocked from two senior posts.

The FSA stopped him taking on a role at City advisory firm Greenhill while the investigation was going on and he was forced to quit headhunter Odgers Berndtson just days after joining when UK Financial Investments - charged with managing state-owned banking assets - withdrew a key contract from the firm.

Mr Cameron led the investment banking team at RBS during the boom years, with the bank widely accused of rapid and risky expansion, snapping up Dutch bank ABN Amro at the height of the market just before the crisis.

RBS had to be bailed out by the state for more than £20 billion after the sector went into freefall amid the credit crunch and is now 83%-owned by Government in return.

The FSA still has two continuing inquiries into the events leading up to the catastrophic collapse of RBS.

It is also said to be looking into the bank's ill-fated takeover of Dutch ABN Amro and the prospectus issued before a £12 billion rights issue announced in early 2008.

In response to today's ban announcement, a spokesman for RBS said: "We welcome the conclusion of this investigation with the settlement between the FSA and our former director Mr Johnny Cameron."

Mr Cameron joined RBS from Dresdner Kleinwort Benson in 1998 and was appointed to the board in March 2006.

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