Standard Bank Denied Access to Rand-Rigging Investigation Record

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – South Africa’s Competition Tribunal declined Standard Bank Group Ltd.’s request for the early release of the investigators’ report into the lender’s alleged part in currency manipulation.

The tribunal, which rules on antitrust matters like a court, won’t “order the immediate production of the record, as Standard Bank was not yet entitled to it,” the Pretoria-based antitrust body said in an emailed statement on Monday. While the earlier production of the investigation record can be provided, a good reason must be put forward, and it would burden those leading the probe, it said.

The Competition Commission, which investigates suspected anti-competitive behavior before passing cases to the tribunal, recommended in February that more than a dozen banks be fined for allegedly manipulating the rand. Standard Bank asked for a meeting that month, but was turned down, according to the lender. It then requested the records of the commission’s investigation and was told they were being prepared. The records were never supplied and in September the commission said the bank’s request had been turned down.

There have been accusations of wrongdoing and errors of process on both sides this year. In filings in May, HSBC Holdings Plc and Investec Bank Ltd. said the commission named the wrong legal entities in its allegations of currency rigging. Standard Bank’s South African unit, Bank of America Merrill Lynch International Ltd. and Standard New York Securities Inc. all said the traders the commission accused of manipulation on their behalf had either never worked for them or never traded the rand. 

The commission agreed in June to cancel formal hearings scheduled to start in July so that it had time to amend its complaint. Further hearings are scheduled for January.

Source: Bloomberg Business News