'Lord Libor' and four other ex-brokers were found not guilty of helping to rig interest rates

Five brokers accused of helping Tom Hayes, the former trader that was called the "ringmaster" behind the LIBOR fixing scandal, were found not guilty on Wednesday.

The former ICAP brokers Colin Goodman, and Danny Wilkinson, ex-brokers from RP Martin Terry Farr and James Gilmour and Noel Cryan of Tullett Prebon all faced the jury in Southwark Crown Court in London.

The trial of the brokers lasted 15 weeks, but the jury was out for less than a day before revealing its verdicts.

The jury reached a not guilty verdict on one charge of conspiracy to defraud faced by Darrell Read, also formerly at ICAP, but is yet to reach an agreement on the second count.

LIBOR - or the London interbank offered rate - is the daily measure meant to show the rate at which banks will lend to each other and is used to set the price of hundreds of trillions of dollars worth of financial products.

The scandal of traders and brokers rigging the rate to benefit their own trades was uncovered in 2012, but Hayes, jailed for 11 years, is so far the only person to have gone to prison for LIBOR rigging.

The decision is a blow to the Serious Fraud Office, who charged the men with a total of five counts of conspiracy to defraud by trying to move the rate linked to the Japanese yen. If the jury had found them guilty, they could have faced up to 10 years in prison. All have pleaded not guilty.

Read, who was allegedly Hayes's primary contact, was known as "Big Nose." Goodman was known as "Lord Libor" while Wilkinson was known as "Sarge."