9 December, Nick Leeson and two hundred and fifty Baring staff from all over the world were flown into New York for a Financial Products Group conference, sales talk and Christmas party hosted by Peter Norris and Ron Baker. The presentation started in the Sheraton hotel’s ballroom at 8 a.m. When Ron stood up and began to talk about the money they were making, Nick sat in the silent. Ron said “Nick Leeson, whom most of you know and all of you have heard of, runs our operation in Singapore, which I hope you all can try to emulate. If you all come up with ideas to follow his footsteps, Baring will become one of the most successful operations in the derivatives business.” During the rest time, Nick went to the bar room and ordered some wines instead of coffee. Nick ran away from the presentation. He was meant to be sitting next to Peter Norris, in the seat of honor but he could not live up to it. He knew that if he opened his mouth, he had started to talk about the losses and the 88888 account. The next day, Nick Leeson heard from George that Mary Walz had wrapped the proceedings up by once again looking at the Singapore operations and asking for a round of applause for the Singapore boys, who had made £ 28 million profit for 1994.