A former UBS trader arrested in London on charges of fraud linked with unauthorized trades that cost the Swiss bank more than $2bn pleaded not guilty Monday to the charges against him.
Kweku Adoboli, 31, pleaded not guilty to two counts of fraud and two of false accounting between 2008 and September 2011 at London's Southwark Crown Court.
The trader was arrested on Sept. 14 after on charges of committing fraud that cost the bank over $2 billion.
The incident pushed then-CEO Oswald Gruebel to resign and damaged the bank's efforts to clean up its image after being involved in a United States tax evasion investigation and sustaining huge losses on subprime mortgages during the financial crisis.
City watchdog the Financial Services Authority and its Swiss counterpart have launched an investigation into why UBS failed to spot allegedly fraudulent trading.
Adoboli's case was delayed last year after he replaced his former lawyers at Kingsley Napley law firm with a new team from Bark & Co., which specializes in fraud cases. McCreath set a provisional trial date for September 3 and remanded Adoboli in custody. He said he was willing to hear an application for bail.
Monday, January 30, 2012
Law Firms Keep Squeezing Associates
Law firms are finally starting to recover from the recession, but they aren't taking their young lawyers along for the ride.
Even as profits return, cautious partners with one eye on damaged balance sheets and the other on stingy clients plan to hang onto the lean silhouettes they acquired during the downturn.
That means little relief for young associates—who took on hefty law-school loans, only to run into layoffs and stagnant pay in the years since 2008—and fewer chances for new law-school graduates to get in on the ground floor. And the elusive brass ring of partnership has grown more remote.
"What happens if Greece falls apart again?" says Greg Nitzkowski, managing partner at Paul Hastings LLP, an international firm that has reduced entry-level hires by about a third since 2008. "We just think it's prudent to plan as if this coming year is going to be a relatively flat year.…We're not planning for a big upsurge in demand."
Conditions at law firms have stabilized since 2009, when the legal industry shed 41,900 positions, according to the Labor Department. Cuts were more moderate last year, with some 2,700 positions eliminated, and recruiters report more opportunities for experienced midlevel associates.
But many elite firms have shrunk their ranks of entry-level lawyers by as much as half from 2008, when market turmoil was at its peak. Salaries and bonuses for those associates have remained generally flat. Meanwhile, a degree at a top law school can cost $100,000 or more.
Associates at prominent law firms say some of their peers hired during the boom years are happy just to have jobs at all. "The world has changed," says a senior associate at a top firm.
Read full article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203363504577186913589594038.html
Even as profits return, cautious partners with one eye on damaged balance sheets and the other on stingy clients plan to hang onto the lean silhouettes they acquired during the downturn.
That means little relief for young associates—who took on hefty law-school loans, only to run into layoffs and stagnant pay in the years since 2008—and fewer chances for new law-school graduates to get in on the ground floor. And the elusive brass ring of partnership has grown more remote.
"What happens if Greece falls apart again?" says Greg Nitzkowski, managing partner at Paul Hastings LLP, an international firm that has reduced entry-level hires by about a third since 2008. "We just think it's prudent to plan as if this coming year is going to be a relatively flat year.…We're not planning for a big upsurge in demand."
Conditions at law firms have stabilized since 2009, when the legal industry shed 41,900 positions, according to the Labor Department. Cuts were more moderate last year, with some 2,700 positions eliminated, and recruiters report more opportunities for experienced midlevel associates.
But many elite firms have shrunk their ranks of entry-level lawyers by as much as half from 2008, when market turmoil was at its peak. Salaries and bonuses for those associates have remained generally flat. Meanwhile, a degree at a top law school can cost $100,000 or more.
Associates at prominent law firms say some of their peers hired during the boom years are happy just to have jobs at all. "The world has changed," says a senior associate at a top firm.
Read full article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203363504577186913589594038.html
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Supreme Court lets tipped employees sue for more pay
The Supreme Court will allow bartenders and servers who make part of their money from tips file lawsuits for more money when they do work that doesn't involve tips.
The high court refused to hear an appeal from Applebee's International, which wanted to overturn a lower court ruling.
Restaurants consider tips part of some employees' salary to get the pay up to the minimum wage. But if a worker spends 20% of the time doing general maintenance and preparation work, they currently get full minimum wage.
Gerald Fast and more than 5,500 other current and former servers and bartenders at Applebee's restaurants sued, saying that opening and closing restaurants, as well as cleaning and stocking, consumed significant work time and Applebee's should pay them additional wages.
The lower courts refused to dismiss the complaint and the high court agreed.
The high court refused to hear an appeal from Applebee's International, which wanted to overturn a lower court ruling.
Restaurants consider tips part of some employees' salary to get the pay up to the minimum wage. But if a worker spends 20% of the time doing general maintenance and preparation work, they currently get full minimum wage.
Gerald Fast and more than 5,500 other current and former servers and bartenders at Applebee's restaurants sued, saying that opening and closing restaurants, as well as cleaning and stocking, consumed significant work time and Applebee's should pay them additional wages.
The lower courts refused to dismiss the complaint and the high court agreed.
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