Nick Leeson

How could one trader, an ambitious 25 years old investment broker, bring down the banking empire that had funded the Napoleonic Wars and counted HM The Queen as one of its private customers? The young gambler who found himself sucked into a terrifying spiral of loss was a working-class boy from Watford, north London, who lived out of his depth, high in an upper-class world until his unchecked gambling caused the downfall of Barings Bank in 1995 and caused chaos in the Singaporean money market.

More recent cases such as Allied Irish Bank, Societe Generale (2008) and UBS (2011) simply highlight that loopholes haven’t been closed. In an exclusive interview for the BBC with Huw Edwards, Nick commented “I think rogue trading is probably a daily occurrence amongst the financial markets. Not enough focus goes on those risk management areas, those compliance areas, those settlement areas, that can ultimately save them money.”

Despite more audacious and larger scale incidents of rogue trading since the collapse of Barings, Nick Leeson remains the most infamous and high-profile rogue trader and one of the world’s most sought-after keynote speakers within the corporate sector. The late Sir David Frost, who interviewed Nick whilst in the Frankfurt prison, optioned the rights to his story and in 1999 the Hollywood film “Rogue Trader” was released as a dramatisation of his story and starred Ewan McGregor (Star Wars, Trainspotting) with Anna Friel (A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Pushing Daisies) portraying his wife at the time.

These events with Nick Leeson represent a unique opportunity for people to meet and question the main protagonist in the largest and most significant financial scandal of the 20th century and gain his personal insight into the current economy and the world today.

Keynote Conference Speaking:

Nick Leeson speaks regularly around the world to companies and organisations from all industries and corporate sectors including financial institutions, insurance companies, security firms, the IT sector and educational facilities including MBA business schools and universities.

Topics covered within his standard presentation include:

• Risk Management
• Corporate Responsibility & Governance
• Compliance, Control and Transparency
• Managing Change and Consolidation
• Importance of Communication and Information Sharing
• Knowledge is Nothing Without Understanding
• Creating The Right Culture in The Organisation
• Transparency Will Outlast Charisma – The ‘Celebrity’ Culture
• Technology – Focus on Analysis and Correlation, Not Just Alerts
• Information to Safeguard is Always there, its Just Whether or Not You Use it