Well, you win some you lose some. On the day that the Financial Services Authority (FSA) announced its largest-ever civil fine, against JP Morgan, the City watchdog also suffered a defeat in its high-profile attempt to secure an insider trading conviction against three men, two of them former City lawyers.
The first case illustrated once more the FSA’s sometimes melodramatic determination to reinvent itself as a get-tough enforcer for the post-crunch age, with the regulator seemingly now digging out the grand rhetoric for every fine over fifty quid.
