Record Fines to Some of the World's Largest Banks

A group of five of the world's largest banks are due to pay a large fine after manipulating the world foreign-exchange market. These fines were brought to the banks by U.K., U.S., and Swedish regulators late last year after finding out that currency traders were using chat rooms to manipulate exchange rates. Included in these banks are JPMorgan, Barclays, Citigroup, UBS, and RBS. Many of the banks have come forward with guilty pleas, which has been unheard of in past litigations against such institutions, as most of the time banks settle litigation without any admission of fault.

Other authorities are looking into additional actions taken by these banks, investigating what could be other criminal activity having to do with electronic trading and manipulation of the energy market and the precious metal market. Many of the banks including UBS are also being separately investigated for possibly manipulating interest rates. The fines that the banks are facing are record breaking, having now paid around $9 billion, which some consider minimal for the damage the banks have caused.

The banks are making it their mission to try and regain the trust of investors, consumers, and businesses by making many public apologies. Hopefully repercussions such as this will help bring down the increasing corrupt behavior that is plaguing the global banking industry.