Rabobank Suspends 2 London Traders in Currency Review

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Last year,  Rabobank admitted criminal wrongdoing by its employees and settled for more than $1 billion over the setting of global benchmark interest rates.Credit Beawiharta/Reuters

LONDON – Two foreign exchange traders working in London for the Dutch lender Rabobank have been suspended after an internal review of the bank’s currency trading operations.

The traders were suspended after the internal inquiry determined that they had breached bank rules on information sharing, a person briefed on the matter said.

“We confirm that we have put two FX traders in our London branch on paid leave of absence,” the bank said on Tuesday.

Bloomberg News reported the suspensions earlier on Tuesday.

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The suspensions come less than a year after Rabobank admitted criminal wrongdoing by its employees and agreed to pay more than $1 billion in criminal and civil penalties to settle investigations by United States, British and other authorities into its role in setting global benchmarks, including the London interbank offered rate, or Libor.

Its chief executive resigned immediately after the settlement.

The Rabobank suspensions are not directly tied to a series of investigations by regulators into whether traders conspired to manipulate the currency markets, but rather the bank’s own internal review of its operations, said the person, who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

Some of the world’s largest banks, including UBS, Citigroup and Deutsche Bank, are facing investigations and have suspended or fired more than two dozen currency traders after their own internal inquiries.

The Justice Department is considering filing charges against at least one bank by the end of the year, and British regulators are nearing a potential settlement with several banks in the currency inquiry, The New York Times reported on Monday. Those fines could total as much as $3.3 billion.