Mister Copper, or mister 5%, was the lord of the copper. His reign was the London Metal Exchange (LME) which for years led the dancing.

From Tokyo, Yasuo Hamanaka, 48, moved 5% of the whole copper for sale on the planet. Until one day, he meet George Soros and the gang of American hedge funds and leave the house he worked for Sumitomo, the more big financial hole ever in the history of world markets.

Hamanaka and Sumitomo group were often in the past, under observation by the authorities of the LME cause suspected to influence not completely regulate the formation of copper prices. There were tensions in '91, when Sumitomo and other Japanese manufacturers were accused of being behind the creation of a situation of scarcity of metal on the market. And there were between 1993 and 1994 when Codelco (Chile Copper Corporation), the world's largest producer of copper, lost to the LME 175 million dollars in a scandal that put upside Chile.

May 8, 1996 the authorities in London on speculation limits imposed on copper after an international investigation lasted six months. Clear that something was happening. The situation worsened when it was discovered at a real war between Hamanaka and some investment funds of the United States to force the price of copper. The powerful American hedge funds were playing the downside, the Japanese desperately opposed them. When prices fell by 25% in a few days, it was clear who had lost. George Soros met with a truckload of other millions of dollars. And with him Julian Robertson's Tiger Fund, a Canadian scrap dealer Herbie Black and at least one major European metals trader.

Sumitomo Corporation, a company trading of the Sumitomo group, born four centuries ago, announced a loss of 198 billion yen, or about 3 trillion lire, for transactions not authorized by the head office, on the copper market.

According to official versions of Sumitomo, the controls would begin towards the mid of May and the manager of the negotiations on the copper Yasuo Hamanaka, considered a guru in the field of copper, was suspended May 17 and immediately there was a repercussion on the market, with a fall in copper prices by 10% in two days. The checks were made later confirmed that Hamanaka, along with a colleague who had resigned from Sumitomo eight years ago, had run for years without recording them on the accounts of companies operations, large quantities of copper: it comes between 500,000 and one million tons of ore.

Hamanaka but kept an accounting staff to be very accurate and updated and was forced to hand it over to the inspectors by Sumitomo.

If you like this article, please press "Like" e "G+" to support us. Thank you!

Articoli che potrebbero interessarti:

Richard Dennis and the turtle traders

Martin S. Schwartz (Buzzy)

Larry R. Williams

Hunt's adventure

Soros, the man who destroyed the Bank of England