FSA Says Banks Pre-Crisis Conduct ‘Unethical’, Telegraph Reports

Banks had unethical conduct in the years before the crisis, according to Martin Wheatley, head of financial conduct at the Financial Services Authority, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

The banks “suspended normal ethical standards and were sellling products that were profitable for the investment banks,” Wheatley told the U.K. newspaper. The products were “not well understood by the banking staff that were introducing them, and not at all understood by customers who were buying them.”

Wheatley will be in charge of one of the FSA’s two successor organizations next year, the newspaper said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Zijing Wu in London at zwu17@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jacqueline Simmons at jackiem@bloomberg.net