Deutsche Bank fined $205M for ‘unsound’ conduct in Forex trading business
Jaclyn Jaeger, 29 September 2028
The New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) has fined Deutsche Bank $205 million as part of a consent order for violations of New York banking law, including efforts to improperly coordinate trading activity through online chat rooms, improperly sharing confidential customer information, trading aggressively to skew prices, and misleading customers.
The violations, announced on June 20, stem from an investigation by NYDFS determining that from 2007 to 2013, when Deutsche Bank was the largest foreign exchange dealer in the world, the bank repeatedly engaged in improper, unsafe, and unsound conduct in its foreign exchange business due to its failures to implement effective controls. In addition, for certain time periods, limited elements of Deutsche Bank’s electronic trading platforms had the potential to improperly disadvantage customers and improperly affect markets, when certain applications did not perform as intended.
The DFS investigation found that a number of Deutsche Bank foreign exchange traders participated in multi-party online chat rooms where participants shared confidential information, discussed coordinating trading activity, and attempted to manipulate foreign exchange currency prices or benchmark rates. By engaging in these activities, these traders sought to diminish competition and increase their profits by executing foreign exchange trades at the expense of customers or the wider market.
