Without sufficient oversight at Barings, the only effective restraint on
Leeson’s reckless doubling strategy was margin calls. He had to be conscious
of them because, if his positions grew too large, Leeson would not be able to
raise the cash needed to meet the margin calls. To cover his tracks, Leeson
convinced Barings London that the margin calls were not a problem. He
fabricated a story that the transfers were needed mostly to meet the margin
calls of Barings’ customers, many of whom lived in different time zones and
had trouble clearing checks in time. He also convinced Barings London that
part of the large margin calls was a normal counterpart of his profitable arbitrage
trading activities. Leeson argued that arbitrage transactions, in general,
earn so little profit per transaction that he needed large gross positions
to conduct his deals. Because these positions were on two separate exchanges,
each with its own margin requirements and therefore having no
mutual netting provisions, he had to pay margins on the gross positions in
both markets. As a result, Leeson persuaded Barings London that the cash
flow difficulties were more apparent than real—basically, an illusion. No
one at Barings London seemed to question Leeson’s explanation even
though it should have been obvious that, if he were paying increasingly