Libor Refuses to Die, Setting Up $370 Trillion Benchmark Battle
- Key rate seeks second life after regulators sound death knell
- Presumptive heir faces challenges as futures trading begins
A struggle that will dictate the future of financial markets is brewing. Long beleaguered Libor is fighting to preserve its status as the premier global benchmark for dollar-based assets just as questions pile up over the credibility of its presumptive heir.
It’s a clash with few equals in financial history. In one corner, the much maligned set of London-based rates that, even after being tainted by rigging scandals, still underpin more than $370 trillion of instruments across various currencies. In the other, a potential successor, conceived over the past four years by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Fed Board of Governors, as well as a who’s who of Wall Street titans, from JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to BlackRock Inc.