Two London traders have been convicted of conspiring to defraud a Russian bank of more than 141 million pounds ($178 million) in a series of complex scams, prosecutors said on Wednesday. Georgy Urumov, 37, and Vladimir Gersamia, 33, were found guilty of multiple offences after a four-month trial at Southwark Crown Court.
The first part of the fraud was carried out in 2011, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.
Urumov joined the Russian-owned company Otkritie Securities Ltd (OSL) and manipulated the firm into paying him approximately 20 million pounds under the false impression that it would be distributed to others also joining the firm. In the event, Urumov held on to the vast majority of the money, the CPS said.
Urumov committed further offences by trading Argentine debt products and fooling his employer into believing that they had been bought at four times their true cost, it said.
He then pocketed the difference and transferred the gains to bank accounts out of the UK.
Urumov used Gersamia, an employee of investment management firm Threadneedle Asset Management, to help cover his tracks.
The CPS said the men had stood to gain another 121 million pounds from their activities.
"These men were successful traders, earning very generous salaries and large bonuses but that was not enough for them," said Alistair Dickson, Specialist Prosecutor in the CPS Specialist Fraud Division.
"Motivated by greed, they went about committing a fraud involving eye-watering sums of money using a variety of sophisticated methods."
He said the help of both Otkritie Securities and Threadneedle Asset Management in providing evidence to the police had been crucial for the prosecution.
A third man, Alessandro Gherzi, 37, was acquitted of two counts of conspiracy to defraud, two counts of conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering.
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