Canary Wharf, London - (Ass Mess): Barclay's Capital has been relegated from its triple-A to junk status after its head of collateralized debt obligations, Edward Cahill, did a runner with a suspected £3 billion of the bank's funds.
Yesterday Standard & Poor said the disappearance was the slippery end of a slimy slope at the debt-trading arm of the company and warned that the scandal now brewing could be far worse than the 1995 £830 million heist of Barings' Nick Leeson fiasco.
Cahill, dubbed 'Captain Sensible' after his hero Robert Maxwell RIP, joined Barclays Capital in 2004 and has presided over the firm's vast portfolio of collateralized debt obligations such as bonds, loans and other liabilities.
His stewardship however has now guaranteed that these multi-millionpound financial packages are worthless, leaving the company as exposed as BCCI when it was busted a decade ago owing £13 billion.
Interpol have been alerted.
