LIBOR, How It's Calculated, and Its Impact on You

Role in the 2012 Scandal and 2008 Financial Crisis

A view of the London Skyline
LIBOR is one of the most important interest rates in the world. It has widespread ramifications for asset prices and the cost of capital for nearly everyone in Western civilization. Photo: Allan Baxter / Photolibrary / Getty Images

LIBOR is the benchmark interest rate that banks charge each other for overnight, one-month, three-month, six-month, and one-year loans. It's the benchmark for bank rates all over the world. LIBOR is an acronym for London Interbank Offered Rate. Reuters publishes the rate each day at 11 a.m. in five currencies: the Swiss franc, the euro, the pound sterling, the Japanese yen, and the U.S. dollar.

On August 4, 2014, the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) Benchmark Administration took over the administration of LIBOR from the British Bankers' Association (BBA). ICE calculates the rates based on submissions from individual contributor banks. An oversight panel of anywhere from 11 to 18 contributor banks is also in place for each currency calculated.

Key Takeaways

  • LIBOR is the global benchmark lending rate banks charge each other on loans.
  • LIBOR also serves as a reference rate for adjustable-type loans such as mortgages, bonds, credit cards, and student loans.
  • LIBOR is quoted in five currencies: U.S. dollar, Swiss franc, pound sterling, euro, and Japanese yen.
  • ICE calculates the rates daily, based on calculation contributions from a designated panel of major global banks.
  • The manipulation scandals of LIBOR led to a regulatory phase-out, which is scheduled to be completed by mid-2023. 

Calculating LIBOR

Before ICE took over, the British Bankers' Association calculated the rate from a panel of banks representing countries in each of the quoted currencies. BBA asked the banks what rate they would charge for a given currency and a given length of time. 

LIBOR's Importance

In addition to setting rates for interbank loans, LIBOR is also used to guide banks in setting rates for adjustable-rate loans. These include interest-only mortgages and credit card debt. Lenders add a point or two to create a profit.

The BBA estimated that $10 trillion in loans is affected by the LIBOR rate. Banks also use LIBOR to calculate interest rate swaps and credit default swaps. These insure banks against loan defaults. 

Banks created LIBOR in the 1980s. They needed a reliable source to set interest rates for derivatives. In 1986, the first LIBOR rate was announced. It was in three currencies: the U.S. dollar, the British sterling, and the Japanese yen.

How LIBOR Affects You

If you have an adjustable-rate loan, your rate will reset based on the LIBOR rate. As a result, if LIBOR rises, so will your monthly payments. The same will happen to your outstanding monthly credit card debt.

Even if you have a fixed-rate loan and pay off your credit cards each month, a rising LIBOR will affect you. It makes all loans more expensive, reducing consumer demand and slowing economic growth. Companies that can't expand won't need to hire. As demand falls, they may even need to lay off workers. If LIBOR remains high, a recession and high unemployment could result.

Regulatory Phase-Out

In 2017, the United Kingdom's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) noted LIBOR was increasingly unlikely to be sustainable. The reason is that banks have slowed down lending to each other. As a result, there aren't enough transactions in some currencies to provide a good estimate of the LIBOR rate. 

The FCA recommended a transition to alternative benchmark rates following the cessation of the publication of LIBOR rates in 2021. Different LIBOR substitutes were evaluated, including the Sterling Overnight Index Average (SONIA), which was hailed as a robust alternative. It uses banks' overnight funding rates in sterling currency. The U.K. Authority will slowly phase in SONIA as LIBOR's replacement, part of international coordination for the transition.

In the United States, the Alternative Reference Rates Committee agreed to use a substitute for USD LIBOR called the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR). The New York Federal Reserve began publishing SOFR rates daily, and this alternative rate has begun to be included in fallback language and in new contracts.

2012 Scandal

In 2012, Barclays Bank was accused of falsely reporting lower rates than they were being offered during the 2005–2009 period. As a result, Barclays was fined $450 million. Its CEO, Bob Diamond, resigned. Diamond said that most other banks were doing the same thing and that the Bank of England knew about it. A London court acquitted six bankers in January 2016. Three bankers were found guilty in 2015: Tom Hayes in August, and Anthony Allen and Anthony Conti of Rabobank in November.

Why would Barclays or any bank lie about its LIBOR rate? A bank could make higher profits by doing so. Most banks see a low LIBOR rate as a mark that the bank is sounder than one with a higher LIBOR rate. Since Barclays submitted a lower rate, you might have benefited, too. A lower LIBOR rate translates to a lower interest rate on many adjustable-rate loans.

How LIBOR Contributed to the 2008 Financial Crisis

In 2008, LIBOR-based credit default swaps helped cause the financial crisis. Banks and hedge funds thought the swaps would protect them from risky mortgage-backed securities.

But when subprime mortgages began to default, insurance companies like the American International Group (AIG) didn't have enough cash to honor the swaps. The Federal Reserve had to bail out AIG. Otherwise, all those who held swaps would have gone bankrupt. 

LIBOR is usually a few tenths of a point above the fed funds rate. In April 2008, the three-month LIBOR rose to 2.9% even as the Federal Reserve dropped its rate to 2%. Banks panicked when the Fed bailed out Bear Stearns. It was going bankrupt from its investments in subprime mortgages. 

Through the summer of 2008, banks wouldn't lend to each other. They feared they would inherit each others' subprime mortgages as collateral. LIBOR rose steadily, reflecting the higher cost of borrowing. In October, the Fed dropped the fed funds rate to 1.5%, but LIBOR rose to a high of 4.8%.

In response, the Dow fell 14% as investors panicked. Why? A higher LIBOR rate is like a fear tax. At the time, the LIBOR rate affected $360 trillion worth of financial products. The size of the problem is mind-boggling. To try and put this into perspective, the entire global economy "only" produces $65 trillion in goods and services. 

As LIBOR rose to a full point above the fed funds rate, it acted as an extra $3.6 trillion in interest being charged to borrowers. It contributed nothing to the economy in return. Investors worried this "fear tax" would slow economic growth. It did exactly that. Not until the $700 billion bailouts helped reassure banks did LIBOR return to normal levels.

Despite LIBOR's return to normal, banks continued to hoard cash. As late as December 2008, banks were still depositing 101 billion euros in the European Central Bank. That was down from the 200 billion euro level at the height of the crisis. But it was much higher than the usual 427 million euro level. Why did they do this? They were afraid to lend to each other. No one wanted more potential subprime mortgage-backed securities as collateral. Banks were afraid their colleagues would just dump more bad debt onto their books. Banks were relying on central banks for their cash needs instead of each other.

The LIBOR rate rose a bit in late 2011 as investors worried about sovereign debt default due to the eurozone crisis. As recently as 2012, credit was still constrained as banks used excess cash to write down ongoing mortgage foreclosures.

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Sources
The Balance uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read our editorial process to learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
  1. BBA. “Back to Basics,”

  2. U.K. Financial Conduct Authority. "Transition From LIBOR."

  3. Alternative Reference Rates Committee. "ARRC Applauds Major Milestone in Transition from U.S. Dollar LIBOR."

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