We are being asked to believe that Colin Armstrong, the man at the centre of Hong Kong's fund management scandal of the 1990s, acted alone.
A joint regulatory investigation has found Jardine Fleming Investment Management, Armstrong's employer, guilty of code breaches in Hong Kong and rule breaches in London.
An award-winning fund manager, Armstrong is said to have favoured certain personal investment accounts by the late allocation of deals in a poorly supervised work environment which allowed him to get away with this activity.
Proper records were not kept, and even when Jardine Fleming management suspected there was misconduct there was a failure to facilitate an investigation. And worse, it is implied that when Jardine Fleming knew of the wrongs being committed by its own staff it did not take sufficient action to remedy it.
The Securities and Futures Commission in Hong Kong tried to portray this embarrassing affair yesterday as an isolated series of events whose key perpetrator was one man - Armstrong.
Executive director of compliance Gerard McMahon said a thorough investigation had taken place and the personal trading activity of fund managers at JF had been scrutinised. It was found that only Armstrong had committed the breaches in question in the case of three funds, two of which were public.
In the case of the infamous Nick Leeson, who brought down Baring Brothers trading Japanese index futures, the matter could be pinned to one man's actions or subterfuge. Leeson executed and settled his own trades in Singapore, thousands of miles away from heavier scrutiny in Hong Kong and London. Hiding losses and booking profits was therefore easy.