Greenpeace FX Losses: It's So Easy, Isn't It?

So Greenpeace have contrived to lose €3.8m in currency speculation !  To quote the great man, one must have a heart of stone to read it without laughing.

But it's easily done, isn't it ?  We're short cable, so that means, errr, we're long, errr ... what was it again?

"to be really clear about what happened, the staff member who lost their job didn’t gamble on stock markets or speculate on currency. ... What went wrong was that someone without proper authority signed contracts to exchange currency. And that ended up losing money because the value of the Euro fell. It’s like choosing a fixed rate mortgage rather than a variable rate mortgage to avoid risky fluctuations - but this time we would have been better off with a variable rate. The staff member didn’t have the authority to make such a big decision" - (Marie from Greenpeace, writing at CiF)

So: speculating, then.  I know it's a nasty word, "Marie from Greenpeace", but there it is.  First the Co-op Bank, then this.  Capitalism, eh?  Short, long, delta, forward curve, mark-to-market ... so many difficult things to learn.   Still, with a budget of €300m ...and if you need some expert banking advice I believe Fred Goodwin is still at a loose end.

"Donors will rightly be surprised and disappointed ... we welcome your comments or questions."   But not so much as to let you post them on our website, you understand.

Yes, we understand.

ND