Jes Staley, the American Chief Executive of Barclays bank, is in an active investigation over his alleged ties with billionaire pedophile and child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
Q4 2019 hedge fund letters, conferences and more
Epstein was an American financier and investor who became a billionaire seemingly “out of nowhere”. Formerly a high school math teacher, Epstein quickly rose through ranks in life. After being a teacher, he started work at Bear Stearns investment bank, after which he founded his own company, J. Epstein and Co. After starting his firm, Epstein got connected to a very large amount of wealthy people, as he marketed his services specifically to “those with assets more than $1 billion”.
Throughout the years, Epstein has been rubbing shoulders with billionaires, A-list celebrities, high-ranking politicians and people of the highest echelons of the elite, but he was always seemingly invisible. This started changing when Epstein came to people’s attention when he pleaded guilty to soliciting a minor for prostitution back in 2008. Epstein was sentenced to 18 months but served only 13. He was even granted a work release and was allowed to go to an office outside his jail for six days a week.
After ending his “sentence”, Epstein was to continue his activities for many more years, until eventually he was arrested again in 2019, and put in Jail. Then, the unthinkable happened - Epstein was found dead in his cell, having allegedly hung himself. Needless to say, this caused massive outrage. Without getting into too much detail, there were a lot of inconsistencies - the security cameras had “malfunctioned” right at the time of the occurrence, security guards were having a break, and many more. It’s worth noting, that Epstein sustained number of injuries that are deemed “extremely unusual” during suicidal hangings, and are much more likely to occur during homicidal strangulations. To top it all off, Epstein was supposed to be on suicide watch, having just attempted to kill himself several weeks ago, but this still happened.
Staley-Epstein Relation: Guilt by Association?
According to Barclays, the relationship between Epstein and Staley was the subject that was inquired by the FCA, to which Barclay’s responded to.
According to the bank, the FCA has since then started an investigation into how Staley himself had described their relationship to Barclays, and how Barclays themselves described it to the regulators.
Staley was running Barclays since 2015, having worked for over 30 years at JPMorgan prior, where he was the head of the investment banking division.
Shares of the bank had dropped by around 3.8% after the news broke out. According to Staley, he had no contact with Epstein since 2015 but acknowledged that he had a “professional relationship” with Epstein going back as early as 2000. According to Staley, their relationship had “tapered off quite significantly” after he left JPMorgan. Staley left JPM in 2013 and worked as a managing partner at Blue Mountain Capital before joining Barclays at the end of 2015.
Staley left JPMorgan in 2013 and became a managing partner at Blue Mountain Capital, a hedge fund, before joining Barclays towards the end of 2015. When asked whether or not he regrets his relationship with Epstein, he said that he does.
Barclays themselves had conducted their own research and concluded that Staley was “sufficiently transparent” regarding the nature of his relationship with Epstein and that they maintain their full confidence in Staley, and will be unanimously recommending him for the re-election at the next meeting.
