‘Fab’ is finished.
Ex-Goldman Sachs fraudster Fabrice Tourre said Tuesday that he won’t fight his conviction, keeping his status as one of the few people to be held responsible for the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis.
Tourre has to pay more than $825,000 in fines. He was found liable on six counts of fraud in August in a case brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“After careful consideration, I have decided not to pursue a lengthy appeal process which, if successful, would lead to a retrial,” he said in a statement. “While my lawyers have advised me there are strong grounds to appeal, I prefer to move forward with my education and close this difficult chapter of my life.”
Tourre, 35, who called himself “Fabulous Fab” in e-mails to his girlfriend, scammed investors in complex mortgage securities called Abacus — one of the deals that contributed to the financial crisis.
While my lawyers have advised me there are strong grounds to appeal, I prefer to move forward with my education and close this difficult chapter of my life.
- Fabrice Tourre
He’s since moved on to getting his Ph.D. in economics at the University of Chicago.
But that hasn’t gone so fabulously, either.
Tourre was supposed to teach an honors economics course, but the school abruptly scrapped that plan.
The French banker gained notoriety for his e-mails, where he bragged about the deals he sold even though the global financial system was on the verge of collapse.
“More and more leverage in the system, The whole building is about to collapse anytime now,” he wrote in one. “Only potential survivor, the fabulous Fab[rice Tourre] … standing in the middle of all these complex, highly leveraged, exotic trades he created without necessarily understanding all of the implications of those monstruosities!!!”
The deals were made up of mortgages — some of which were picked by hedge-fund manager John Paulson — that were the most likely to fail.
Goldman later said that its marketing materials contained “incomplete information.” The bank settled for $550 million without admitting wrongdoing.