Deutsche Bank fined £1.6bn for rate-rigging
A leading City bank is to pay a record £1.6bn fine as part of a settlement with US and UK regulators over the rigging of interest rates.
Deutsche Bank’s fine from the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) amounted to a record £227m after the watchdog found traders manipulated rate submissions between January 2005 and December 2010. The FCA also accused the lender of repeatedly misleading it.
Other fines from authorities in the United States included $800m from the Commodities Futures Trading Commission.
Georgina Philippou, the FCA’s acting director of enforcement and market oversight, said: “This case stands out for the seriousness and duration of the breaches by Deutsche Bank – something reflected in the size of today’s fine.
“One division at Deutsche Bank had a culture of generating profits without proper regard to the integrity of the market. This wasn’t limited to a few individuals but, on certain desks, it appeared deeply ingrained.”
The manipulation involved at least 29 Deutsche Bank staff and was primarily based in London but also Frankfurt, Tokyo and New York.
The FCA said their behaviour went unchecked because of inadequate systems and controls, with the Bank taking more than two years to identify and produce all the relevant audio recordings it had requested.
Deutsche Bank tried to claim to the FCA that its systems had been adequate, even though the person making this statement knew it to be false.
