$4billion fine to Six banks in currency probe

Each day $5 trillion is traded in the global currency market. London has a huge part in it. Forex rate touches various part of economy: outsourcing cost, export price, price of imported goods, company earnings and many investments held by pension funds and others.


HSBC (HSBC),  RBS (RBS), Citibank (C), JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and UBS (UBS) will collectively pay $1.4 billion to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission and about £1.1 billion ($1.75 billion) to the U.K.'s Financial Conduct Authority. UBS will also make a payment in Switzerland.
In total it's $4.33 billion in fines to global regulators to resolve allegations that these six banks attempted to manipulate foreign exchange rates. The British regulator is imposing such huge fines for the first time. It is still investigating possible manipulations at Barclays (BCS). British regulators said 36 banks that operate in the foreign exchange market, including the five fined Wednesday, will be required to participate in a program to change banking culture and ensure management take more responsibility.

According to the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said Bank of America (BAC), Citibank and JPMorgan Chase will pay a combined penalties. It's been said that it's $950 million in penalties.

CFTC's director of enforcement, Aitan Goelman said,"The market only works if people have confidence that the process of setting these benchmarks is fair, not corrupted by manipulation by some of the biggest banks in the world."

Between 2008 and 2013, traders shared confidential information and worked with their counterparts at other institutions in an effort to fix rates and increase profits. Traders were working for the profit of banks rather than their client. Regulators said they used private online chatrooms to execute deal to shift currency prices in their favor. These traders called themselves "the players", "the 3 musketeers" and the "the A-team." They try to manipulate the so-called 4 p.m. fix, a 60-second snapshot of afternoon trading in London that forms the basis of a widely-used benchmark.

The banks and traders behaved unacceptably and it could go further o investigation. The banks and individual employees might also face criminal charges in both the U.K. and U.S. over attempts to manipulate the rates. The Federal Reserve is also anticipated to be investigating banks' conduct in the currency market.

UBS was also penalized by Swiss regulators. It will pay a total of $800 million. Citibank will pay the second largest total fine at $668 million.

The CFTC said it has fined more than $3.34 billion relating to the manipulation of global benchmarks since June 2012.