Price Fixing: 12 banks to pay $1.9b in settlement

A group of investors led by the pension fund of a unit of the Sheet MWU filed the class-action lawsuit in 2013

NEW YORK: A dozen major banks have agreed to pay $1.9 billion to settle allegations of price-fixing in the market for credit default swaps, a derivative that acts as insurance against bond defaults. JPMorgan Chase, BNP Paribas of France and Barclays of Britain were among the banks striking the deal to settle investor allegations in US District Court in Manhattan. A group of investors led by the pension fund of a unit of the Sheet Metal Workers union filed the class-action lawsuit in 2013. They accused the defendants of rigging the CDS market and making them pay unfairly higher prices for the instruments. The other banks in the settlement are four US banks, Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley; and five foreign banks: Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland, and UBS. The $1.866 billion settlement agreement is expected to be finalised in seven to 10 days.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 13^th, 2015.

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