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BERLIN: Three executives dubbed “Germany’s
stupidest bankers” in the press have been suspended from state
bank KfW over erroneous transfers of more than 500 million euros
($710 million) to the bankrupt Lehman Brothers.
Two board members and a top risk
control manager were suspended “pending final clarification of the
incident” following a meeting of KfW’s supervisory board meeting
attended by top ministers including Finance Minister Peer
Steinbrueck, the bank said in a statement late Thursday.
A law firm has also been hired to
see if further “consequences” are appropriate and the bank,
already under fire over its rescue of IKB—Germany’s biggest
casualty of the subprime crisis—will subject its business
procedures, especially those of risk management, to an “in-depth
audit.”
The bank state-owned lender
mistakenly transferred more than 350 million euros to Lehman
Brothers on Monday, after the US investment bank filed for
bankruptcy protection, and according to the Bild daily the total
exposure has since been established at 536 million euros.
“I have never experienced
anything like it in my life,” Bild quoted Steinbrueck as saying
after the meeting.
--AFP
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