Cultural failures at JP Morgan, Barclays and HBOS

Newly released reports into the failures of management at several major banks – HBOS, Barclays, and JP Morgan among them – show that some of the worst losses had roots deeper than the 2008 credit crisis. Toxic internal culture and poor management, not the subprime mortgage collapse, caused billion-dollar losses at some of the world’s largest banks

Bob Diamond, ex-Barclays chief executive, after giving evidence to the UK Treasury Select Committee in 2012

The original narrative of the financial crisis depicted an industry undermined by unwise investment in unexpectedly weak US subprime mortgage products. The knock-on effect of the subprime mortgage market's weakness, coupled with poor credit risk management and uncertainty about interbank exposures, caused a systemic crisis that brought down banks and other financial institutions in the US and elsewhere. To say the least, this account has now been shown not to be the whole story – instead, as a