WE WON'T MEET AGAIN - LEESON'S FINAL FAX

BY JEREMY WARNER

and JOHN WILLCOCK

Nick Leeson, the 28-year-old trader responsible for breaking the City's oldest merchant bank, gave a detailed description of his ruinous transactions to Peter Baring, the bank's chairman, in a faxed letter of resignation sent shortly after his disappearance last Thursday.

All that is so far known of what is in the letter is that Mr Leeson signed off with an apology and the line that he doubted the two would ever meet again.

From sources in London and Singapore it is emerging that Mr Leeson only entered into his suicidal series of fraudulent trades after he had incurred substantial losses on behalf of Barings' London office.

Bank of England investigators have been questioning any Barings staff in London involved in the supervision of the Singapore office and with the Far Eastern settlement operation.

The investigators have been examining whether there has been any collusion with Mr Leeson from London. City sources said that some time ago Barings provided the Singapore office with a "significant sum", thought to be about £50m, to cover its daily margin calls. Leading American law firms are preparing to sue Barings over hundreds of millions of pounds invested in the failed bank's fund management side, which they claim should have been independently held. The threat of such litigation could complicate difficult talks being held by Ernst & Young, the administrators, to dispose of Barings in whole or in part.

Investigators in Singapore have established that as far back as a month ago, Barings' London treasury department began large-scale funding of margin calls as losses on Mr Leeson's positions began to mount.

It is not clear if Mr Leeson was at that stage dealing on behalf of the bank or its clients. He then dramatically in