Nov 14th 2019MILANIN THE VAULTS of Monte dei Paschi di Siena is a torn and yellowing sheet of paper: a death sentence from the 15th century, handed down for trying to steal gold from what may be the world’s oldest bank. Monte Paschi’s archivists now have another historic sentence for their files. On November 8th a court in Milan convicted former executives for hiding vast losses from derivatives transactions a decade ago, in collusion with bankers from Deutsche Bank and Nomura. It was one of the harshest penalties imposed anywhere relating to the financial crisis.Thirteen people were convicted, including Michele Faissola, Deutsche Bank’s former global head of rates, and Sadeq Sayeed, Nomura’s former chief executive for Europe. Giuseppe Mussari, Monte Paschi’s former chairman, received the heaviest sentence, of seven years and six months. Deutsche Bank and Nomura were fined a total of nearly €160m ($176m). Monte Paschi, which was nationalised in 2017 as its losses spiralled, had already settled.Choose us for news analysis that respects your time and intelligenceSubscribe to The EconomistWe filter out the noise of the daily news cycle and analyse the trends that matterWe give you rigorous, deeply researched and fact-checked journalism. That’s why Americans named us their most trusted news source in 2017Available wherever you are—in print, digital and, uniquely, in audio, fully narrated by professional broadcastersThis website adheres to all nine of NewsGuard‘s standards of credibility and transparency.ORContinue reading this articleRegister with an email address