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Two former Barclays Libor trader have been found not guilty of rigging the benchmark interest rate.

In a London this morning, Ryan Reich and Stylianos Contogoulas were acquitted of conspiring with others to manipulate the US dollar London interbank offered rate (Libor) from 2005 to 2007.

Both men admitted asking for rates that would benefit their own books but they said they were merely following orders from higher up.

It was the pair's second trial after a jury was unable to reach a verdict in July last year.

While Mr Reich and Mr Contogoulas avoided conviction, some of their former colleagues were not so lucky. At least four are serving sentences of up to five and a half years over the scandal that led to more than $9 billion in fines for various financial institutions.

Former UBS and Citigroup trader Tom Hayes was the first person to be convicted in 2015.

However, six of Hayes' alleged co-conspirators were acquitted last year.

The Libor scandal was one of the biggest financial scandals of all time, leading to more than $9 billion in fines for the various banks involved and costing Bob Diamond his job as Barclays CEO.

The Libor rate was decided each day by a panel made up of 16 banks, which were asked to estimate how much it would cost them to borrow from each other for different periods.

The rate is a key benchmark that affects more than $350 trillion in securities, including loans and mortgages.

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