Is it a famous quote or something? I doubt he was the first guy to think of it, and neither was anyone at Barings. Anyone in trading could feasibly have thought of it independently.

Leeson certainly wasn't the first guy to think of it but he did in fact bring down the house by using exactly that strategy and Barings ended up not being there tomorrow one day on account of that. Lots of oversight failures.

Ah, I thought you meant that the quote was from someone related to Barings, and my boss had nicked (lol) it.

Which could totally have been the case, naturally everyone on the floor had watched the movie and some knew the people involved.

I think the mistake is mine, I should have asked if your boss said this before or after Baring's went under.