Banks are in the business of trading financial instruments, such as currencies,
bonds, common stocks, and many other financial assets, including derivatives.
This trading can be done as a service to clients and/or to earn outright
trading profits. For auditing and control purposes, the difference is
important. Trading that is done only as a service for customers requires the
bank to have strict rules concerning account management and credit risk
management for individual customers. By contrast, trading done for the
house requires strict exposure limits on the bank’s traders, because this type
of trading puts the bank’s equity directly at risk. In either case, derivative
trading requires top management to have a clear idea of how profits are
earned and the risks associated with such returns. On both counts, the
managers at Barings Bank were deficient.
Traders profit by taking advantage of small movements in market prices.
Because there are so many different markets and so many different instruments,
these traders tend to specialize and become experts in their own
narrow segments of the financial world. To do their jobs well, traders need
to feel that they are a jump ahead of the other people who trade the same
instruments, and so they become very knowledgeable about the particular
instruments they trade. Sometimes this depth of knowledge leads traders to
believe that they can actually predict in which direction the market will
move.18
Such confidence can be dangerous, because there is no room for selfdelusion
or ego trips. When they suffer losses, traders have to close out
their losing positions quickly before the losses get too large, and then move
onward, with their self-assurance as strong as ever. In other words, they
have to have an unshakable conviction that their superior knowledge and
trading skills will make them net winners in the long run, but they also
have to pay due homage to the capricious and inscrutable movements of
the market. Because the risks of carrying open trading positions can be very
high, most traders need special permission from their managers at the end
of each day to carry an unbalanced position overnight.
The activities of traders have to be controlled closely, which means their
positions have to be strictly monitored and audited; yet, within a bank