Banks hit world by US fraud | Banks scandal over worldwide

Banks hit world by US fraud | Banks hit worldwide a Huge scandal or fraud.

Some of the world's biggest banks revealed that they are victims of an American investment fund. This is the biggest financial scandal, probably in the history of the markets - $ 50 billion is a huge amount.

Among the banks, which have been hit is Britain's RBS, Spain, Santander and France's GDP Paribas.One of the city's best-known fund managers have criticized U.S. financial regulators for failing to uncover the alleged fraud.

According to the U.S. Attorney criminal complaint in court, Mr Madoff told at least three employees on Wednesday that hedge fund business - which served up to 25 clients and had $ 17.1bn under management - was a fraud and had been insolvent for years.

Banks and financial institutions worldwide had investments with Bernard Madoff:

• Spain's largest bank, Santander, which also owns the British High Street bank Abbey, Alliance & Leicester and Bradford & Bingley, said one of its funds had $ 3.1bn invested in the company run by Bernard Madoff
• Royal Bank of Scotland, said Monday it potentially could lose around £ 400m from the alleged fraud, if all its investments were written off
• The French bank Natixis, a subsidiary of the Caisse d'Epargne and Banque Populaire, said it could potentially lose up to 450 million euros (£ 402m; $ 605m)
• France's BNP Paribas estimated its exposure to more than $ 460m
• Japanese bank Nomura said its exposure was relatively small, at about 27.5bn yen (£ 201m), and added: "We see this as non-material, considering our capital base."
• One of the world's biggest investment groups, man, said it had invested around $ 360m through its RMF institutional fund of funds business, representing 0.5% of its total funds
• Spain's second largest bank, BBVA, said it could lose 300m euros ($ 400m)