Swiss competition commission fines banks

The Swiss competition commission (COMCO) has fined several international and Swiss banks for forming cartels to collaborate on different interest rates derivatives. According to the announcement on Wednesday, different investigations found that the following banks took part: Credit Suisse, UBS, Deutsche Bank, US financial institutions Citigroup and JPMorgan, British banks Barclays and the Royal Bank of Scotlan, and the French Société Générale. The total fines add up to CHF99 million ($96 million). The investigation began in 2012, and since then COMCO has looked through around nine million electronic pages of information and phone records. The commission said that 16 banks and five brokers were involved. Euro interest rate derivatives COMCO found that the banks formed a cartel “aimed at distorting the normal course of pricing components” for the derivatives. Between 2005-2008 Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland and Société Générale collaborated for ...