London - Talked-up by Red Tops on Monday this week as executing Canary Wharf's historic 18 billion euro ($28.6 billion) currency trade today's headlines are, naturally, a bit of a disappointment.
Harry's spurious involvement in the City's 'biggest ever forward foreign exchange deal' now turns out to coincide with a mystery £1.3billion loss at Gnomes of Zurich Bank AG.
The institution has been repeatedly accused by FBI investigators of helping wealthy American investors evade tax through complex offshore scams.
In 2009 it paid out a record $780 million fine to the US Government following a series of protracted lawsuits.
Today UK fraud squad sleuths were hurriedly called in as the bank's shares slumped by more than 7% on news of the sudden £1.3billion loss.
It now emerges that the Prince's ten grand 'appearance fee' - supposedly allocated to the Save Prince Harry's Ass Charitable Foundation - may now face forcible repatriation as frantic balance sheet holes spread.
Some City sources remain largely unworried, however, citing the 1995 UK record for a single trader's bankruptcy of his employers as
Nick Leeson's £800million punt that caused the collapse of Barings.
That was eclipsed in 2008 by French rogue trader Jerome Kerviel who took Societe Generale for £3.7billion.
"Still, if they nick Harry, his Qatari oil and gas paymasters are bound to cough up," an optimistic colleague chirped.
An update is expected soon.
