Abstract

The rise of global finance in the latter twentieth century was an epochal transformation in the history of capitalism and new socio-technical devices emerged to value these innovations, among the most significant being the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR). Today, LIBOR values over $200 trillion in global financial markets despite the repeated attempts by international regulators to repeal the benchmark since its infamous scandal in 2012. How did LIBOR ever rise to its apotheosis in global finance? In this paper, I provide a historical analysis of the rise of LIBOR in global finance, tracing its emergence as an unstandardized rate for eurodollar syndicated loans in the 1960s to its evolution as a standardized benchmark for the growing derivative market in London by the 1980s. In tracing the rise of LIBOR, I argue that global financial markets were shaped by practices and norms particular to the financial centre of London. I conclude by offering the concept of ‘positionality’ to help theorize the construction of global finance.

摘要

20 世纪后期全球金融的兴起是资本主义历史上的一次划时代的转变，新的社会技术手段出现了以重视这些创新，其中最重要的是伦敦银行同业拆借利率 (LIBOR)。如今，尽管国际监管机构自 2012 年臭名昭著的丑闻以来一再试图废除该基准，但如今，LIBOR 在全球金融市场上的价值超过 200 万亿美元。LIBOR 是如何在全球金融中崛起的？在本文中，我对 LIBOR 在全球金融中的兴起进行了历史分析，追溯其在 1960 年代作为欧洲美元银团贷款的非标准化利率出现，以及到 1980 年代其作为伦敦不断增长的衍生品市场的标准化基准的演变过程。在追踪 LIBOR 的上升过程中，我认为，全球金融市场是由伦敦金融中心特有的实践和规范塑造的。最后，我提出了“位置性”的概念，以帮助对全球金融的构建进行理论化。