Too Big To Jail? DoJ: Wall St. Bailout Buds 'Co-Conspirators' In Plot To Rip Off State, Local Governments

JPMorgan Chase & Co., Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and UBS AG were among more than a dozen Wall Street firms involved in a conspiracy to pay below-market interest rates to U.S. state and local governments on investments, according to documents filed in a U.S. Justice Department criminal antitrust case.

A government list of previously unidentified “co-conspirators” contains more than two dozen bankers at firms also including Bank of America Corp., Bear Stearns Cos., Societe Generale, two of General Electric Co.’s financial businesses and Salomon Smith Barney, the former unit of Citigroup Inc., according to documents filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan on March 24.'

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Town Hall Bosses Advise on Pay Rises For . . . Town Hall Bosses

TOWN HALL bosses are operating a private consultancy that has helped to increase their pay by more than 30% in four years.

Solace Enterprises, a recruitment company, is paid fees of about £20,000 by local councils to headhunt chief executives and recommend salary levels.

Its advice has contributed to burgeoning pay packets for chief executives, many of whom are now paid more than £150,000 a year. The company is wholly owned by the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers (Solace), which represents town hall bosses. The company’s directors include a number of serving chief executives.

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