The BBC reports Anthony Allen and Anthony Conti, who worked for Dutch lender Rabobank, were convicted by a New York jury. The US Department of Justice came to an arrangement with Rabobank in October 2013 for $1bn (£657m) over its part in controlling Libor.
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“Today’s verdicts illustrate the department’s successful efforts to hold accountable bank executives responsible for this global fraud scheme”, Leslie Caldwell, an assistant attorney general, said in a statement.
The trial, in federal court in Manhattan, had been seen as an important test for U.S. prosecutors who have extracted billions of dollars in fines from financial institutions for manipulating Libor, but had yet to convict any individual bankers for breaking the law.
The trial follows the summer conviction of Tom Hayes in London, a former UBS and Citigroup trader sentenced in August to 14 years in prison for Libor manipulation.
The 46-year-old, from Essex, said he and his co-defendant Anthony Allen, 44, will be appealing the decision.
Releasing them on bail, he said the pair would be foolish to flee – making them “pariahs for life” – before they are sentenced. “We’re disappointed with the verdict, but Tony looks forward to pursuing all the legal avenues and options”.
The Libor scandal blew up in 2012 when it emerged that banks had been lying in the figures on which Libor was set.
Evidence at trial established that Allen, who was Rabobank’s global head of liquidity and finance and the manager of the company’s money market desk in London, oversaw a system in which Rabobank employees who traded in these LIBOR-linked derivative products influenced the employees who submitted Rabobank’s LIBOR contributions to the BBA.
Government lawyers said they were able to do so because Rabobank was one of the banks that submitted an estimate of what it cost for banks in London to borrow from one another.
They argued that prosecutors took documents out of context and cooperating witnesses lied about their clients’ role to try and get off with lenient sentences.
“But we were biasing submissions or shading it to help the traders”, he said.
“If you have a scheme, the only way the scheme can work is that it can’t be too obvious”, he told reporters outside of court.
Their convictions are expected to be challenged on the grounds that a few testimony given by the two men should be thrown out.
So far, 13 individuals have been charged in the U.S.in connection with the investigation and a handful of defendants have pleaded guilty, including three other former Rabobank traders.
The U.S. Justice Department accused the men of abusing their positions at the Dutch bank Rabobank to manipulate interest rates.
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Beyond Allen, Conti and the three cooperators, USA prosecutors have also brought charges against two other Rabobank traders including Paul Thompson, who is facing extradition after being arrested earlier this month in Australia.
