U.S. regulators claimed their first victory in a four-year
old effort to crack down on oil market manipulation on Thursday, announcing a
$14 million settlement with high-frequency trading firm Optiver., Reuters reports.
In a ruling that came just two days after U.S. President
Barack Obama proposed a renewed campaign against illegal oil trading schemes,
the Amsterdam-based company agreed to disgorge $1 million in profits and pay a
$13 million civil penalty over allegations it used a rapid-fire tool nicknamed
"The Hammer" to influence U.S. oil prices in 2007.
It was the first case brought by the Commodity Futures
Trading Commission (CFTC) in its 2008 effort to curb market malfeasance,
launched as prices soared toward a record near $150 a barrel in the middle of
that year. The case alleged that traders in Optiver's Chicago office
reaped a $1 million profit by engaging in a practice called "banging the
close", in which the firm attempted to move U.S. oil prices by executing a
large volume of deals during the final moments of trading....
Wait, wait...there's more at http://finance.yahoo.com/news/high-frequency-trader-optiver-pays-023628616.html
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