The European Commission suspects Deutsche Bank AG, Credit Suisse Group AG and two other global banks of colluding to manipulate a multi-trillion-dollar government-backed bond market, escalating a long running probe.
The European Union’s executive arm, which opened the investigation almost three years ago, said in a statement Thursday that banks will now lay out their defenses. If found guilty, they could face a fine of up to 10% of their annual world-wide revenue. The commission didn’t name the banks. Deutsche Bank and Credit Suisse confirmed they were among the four. Shares of Deutsche Bank
DB, -3.35%
DBK, -6.46%
DBK, -5.78%
were down 5% and Credit Suisse
CS, -0.93%
CSGN, -3.38%
shares were 3.1% lower Thursday.
Other banks including Bank of America Corp.
BAC, -0.64%
and France’s Credit Agricole SA
ACA, -3.35%
, had previously said in filings that regulators had asked for information about their trading of such bonds. Bank of America declined to comment and Crédit Agricole didn’t immediately respond to requests.
Another bank, Nomura Holdings Inc.
NMR, -3.34%
8604, -6.17%
that had been probed in the case, said it isn’t among the four banks.
An expanded version of this story can be found on WSJ.com.
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Source : MTV
