Competition record
Citigroup
Deep profile · 1 linked library matter
Citigroup is a global bank whose markets division trades currencies for clients and for the firm. Its foreign-exchange desk was in the EU cartel around the WM/Reuters fix, and the library status is fined.
Overview
Citigroup is a New York bank with consumer franchises and a large institutional business. Companies and fund managers use its foreign-exchange desk to change currencies. The desk also trades around benchmark rates, including the WM/Reuters fix, a daily snapshot that many contracts use as the official rate.
Between about 2007 and 2013, traders at Citigroup and other banks coordinated in chat rooms. They shared what client orders they were holding into the fix and traded in ways meant to push that published rate. Citigroup is named in the library's EU forex file with Barclays and JPMorgan.
The Commission and national authorities fined banks for the coordination. The library status is fined. This profile does not give Citigroup's fine or a group total.
Competition footprint
A benchmark used in funds and commercial contracts is the price the chat rooms targeted.
Sharing a client's order flow with a rival desk is the information that made the coordination possible.
Fines from the Commission and from national regulators are the recorded outcome.
Consumer & business angle
Companies and asset managers who executed at the fix were the customers of the rate.
Competing banks' traders were the counterparties in the chat rooms.
What to watch
- Benchmark methodology changes that make the fix harder to lean on with a shared order book.
- Civil claims that rely on the EU finding without restating each bank's penalty.
Markets
foreign exchange · global banking · foreign exchange spot · currency benchmarks
Also known as: citi, citibank