Barclays: Tic Toc, says MiniLulz
The Ministry of Lulz, part of the Anonymous collective, has issued a ‘tic toc’ warning to Barclays. ‘Tic toc’ (or its variants – Jester uses #ticktock) merely says, ‘there’s more coming, and the clock is ticking…’
MiniLulz is concerned about the timing of two different Barclays announcements on the successful integration of Lehmans into its business – announcements separated by more than a year. The second announcement is reported by ComputerWorld: “Barclays has completed the integration of collapsed bank Lehman Brothers’ North American operations.” This came about 16 months after the acquisition – the sort of time you might expect for two major companies to integrate their systems.
But it’s the first announcement that concerns MiniLulz. This came just three months after the acquisition. It said, “Our clients now have the benefit of a fully integrated investment bank able to offer the full array of risk management, financing and advisory products. We are now operating as one firm…” And it immediately led to a massive surge in the share value of Barclays: ‘from a low of 51.20 on the 23 January 2009 to 88.70 on the 26 January 2009,’ says MiniLulz.
Problem is, the link to this first announcement provided by MiniLulz doesn’t go anywhere:
Barclay’s non-announcement
So is this Anonymous making up stories? No. What goes onto the Internet doesn’t easily come off the internet. A quick search reveals a news story in the New York Times (dated 23 January 2009) discussing the same Barclay’s announcement and providing a similar link that also now goes nowhere. So we can be pretty certain that the announcement happened, was published – and has since been removed.
The NYT article actually starts:
It was one of the speediest merger integrations in Wall Street history.
Barclays Completes Integration of Lehman Assets
It must have been. And immediately after this announcement, Barclays seems to have increased in value by more than 50%. Which is the more accurate timing for the integration? They cannot both be right.
UPDATE:
The MiniLulz link was incorrect. It should be: http://www.barcap.com/about-barclays-capital/press-office/news-releases/2009/01/barclays-capital-completes-integration-of-lehman-brothers–expan.html
This link still works for the first announcement. Barclays did not remove it.
As soon as the story was posted, MiniLulz checked the link, found their error, and immediately informed me.
However, the link provided in the NYT article does lead to the ‘Page cannot be found’ image. I have therefore decided to leave the graphic in the original post. I do not believe that, in the normal course of events, a post once posted should be subject to change – just ‘updates’ as per this update/correction.
