Barclays and Former Executives Charged over Qatar Fund-Raising

LONDON — With two capital infusions in 2008, Barclays was able to survive the financial crisis without a government bailout even as other British banks teetered.

Now, those deals, struck with the Persian Gulf nation of Qatar and other investors, have come back to haunt Barclays as it is trying to escape a thicket of legal and reputational problems.

British authorities on Tuesday charged the bank and four former top executives, accusing them of misrepresenting arrangements with Qatar as the bank secured a total of $15 billion.

The criminal charges are the first to have been brought in Britain against a bank for actions taken during the financial crisis. The four former executives — including John S. Varley, who had led the bank — are among the most senior bank managers to be charged anywhere in a crisis-era case.

Barclays, a global bank with large operations in New York as well as London, has been working to revive its business since a scandal over the manipulation of the London interbank offered rate, or Libor, shook it to its core in 2012.

The Qatar case threatens to undercut that turnaround effort and push the bank further into a legal morass.

In the United States, Barclays faces a Justice Department lawsuit over mortgage-backed securities. And its chief executive, James E. Staley, is being investigated in Britain over an effort to identify a whistle-blower.

On Tuesday, Barclays said of the British charges that it was “considering its position in relation to these developments.”

The board of Barclays met recently to review its options — whether to plead guilty or not — a person briefed on the matter said Tuesday. The possibility of entering a deferred prosecution agreement, which would avoid criminal charges, was never on the table in discussions with the Serious Fraud Office of Britain, this person said.

Jonathan Pickworth, who heads the white-collar practice at the law firm White & Case in London, asked why Britain’s fraud office had moved forward with a case so long after the initial infusion.

“Why is it in the public interest to prosecute the bank for its fund-raising efforts almost a decade ago?” Mr. Pickworth said. “Who does it punish, and what purpose does it serve? All the former management team moved on many years ago. This will only hurt the current shareholders and today’s hardworking employees.”

Shares of Barclays fell nearly 2 percent in trading in London.

Global banks, including Barclays, have paid billions of dollars in fines in recent years as a result of abuses involving mortgages, Libor and currencies. And Barclays was one of four banks that entered guilty pleas in 2015 to federal crimes in the United States over a scheme to manipulate the foreign exchange market.

Still, criminal charges against a bank and former top executives are rare.

The Qatar case revolves around actions by Barclays as it sought to avoid a bailout during declining economic conditions in 2008.

The bank raised nearly 12 billion pounds — about $15 billion at current exchange rates — from an arm of Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund and other investors in two deals, in June and October 2008. The moves allowed it to avoid a bailout as a number of major banks on both sides of the Atlantic floundered and sought government lifelines.

The Serious Fraud Office has been scrutinizing whether Barclays properly disclosed an agreement with Qatar that led it to pay more than £300 million for “advisory services” as part of the fund-raising. The office has also been examining a $3 billion loan facility that Barclays made available to the Qatar government in November 2008.

The fraud office said that it had charged Barclays, Mr. Varley, its former chief executive, and the former executives Roger A. Jenkins, Thomas L. Kalaris and Richard W. Boath with conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation related to the June 2008 fund-raising.

Barclays, with Mr. Varley and Mr. Jenkins, was also charged with providing unlawful financial assistance and an additional conspiracy count related to the October 2008 capital raising.

Lawyers for Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Kalaris, an American (unlike the others), declined to comment.

Mr. Boath said the fraud office’s decision to bring charges against him was based on a “false understanding” about his role and the facts. He said that he was “not a decision maker” and that he would defend the charges “vigorously.”

A lawyer for Mr. Varley, who was chief executive from 2004 to 2010, did not respond to requests for comment. On Tuesday, Mr. Varley resigned from the boards of BlackRock and Rio Tinto.

The four men are expected to appear in Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London on July 3. The fraud office has provided scant detail about the underlying accusations, as charging documents are not filed publicly in Britain before the first court appearance.

Mr. Jenkins, 61, was the executive chairman of investment banking and investment management in the Middle East and North Africa at Barclays Capital. He helped arrange the fund-raising.

Mr. Kalaris, 61, was the chief executive of Barclays Wealth and Investment Management. Mr. Boath, 58, was the European head of Barclays’ Financial Institutions Group.

Barclays said it had been told that the fraud office had not decided whether it would also bring charges against Barclays Bank P.L.C., an operating unit, with respect to the loan.

The decision to bring criminal charges against Barclays comes as some have questioned whether the Serious Fraud Office should remain a stand-alone agency.

Before the recent general election, as part of the Conservative Party platform, Prime Minister Theresa May proposed that it merge with another agency, a move she also spoke of in her previous job as home secretary, the cabinet post responsible for policing and domestic security.

The inquiry into the fund-raising is one of a number of regulatory issues that have bedeviled Barclays in recent years. The bank paid $450 million in penalties over allegations it helped manipulate Libor, and its American chief executive, Robert E. Diamond Jr., subsequently resigned.

The bank’s current chief, Mr. Staley, also an American, has been seeking to move Barclays past its regulatory burdens since he arrived in December 2015. He has moved aggressively to sell businesses the bank does not consider core operations and resolve legacy misconduct issues that have been a drag on its results.

Barclays has said it would no longer be in a restructuring mode by later this year, but it still faces several regulatory issues.

In December, the United States Justice Department sued the bank, accusing it of fraudulently misleading the public in the sale of tens of billions of dollars in securities backed by home mortgages. Barclays has said the claims are “disconnected from the facts” and has vowed to “vigorously defend” itself.

In April, the bank disclosed that Mr. Staley was being investigated by the British authorities after he sought to learn the identity of a whistle-blower. Mr. Staley has apologized over his handling of the matter.

The Financial Conduct Authority, another British regulator, reopened its own investigation into the capital raising this year after new documents emerged.

The authority indicated in 2013 that it planned to fine Barclays £50 million in the case and that the bank had been “reckless” in breaching disclosure rules related to the advisory agreements, the bank previously said. At the time, the Financial Conduct Authority’s inquiry was stayed pending the fraud office’s decision on its separate investigation.

The United States Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission also are investigating the matter.

The British financier Amanda Staveley has separately sued Barclays over the capital raising, saying the bank improperly favored the Qataris in the deal and cost her firm nearly $1 billion in potential profit.

The capital raising allowed Barclays to avoid taking government support at the time, unlike its British rivals Lloyds Banking Group and the Royal Bank of Scotland.

Both Lloyds and the Royal Bank of Scotland sold large stakes to the British government as part of their bailouts. The British government recently sold its final stake in Lloyds but still owns 72 percent of the Scottish bank.