JP Morgan Chase to pay $920mln in penalties in $6bln trader scam

JP Morgan Chase has reportedly agreed to pay total of 920 million dollars in penalties to US and UK regulators, admitting wrongdoing as part of its settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Co-director of SEC's Division of Enforcement, George Canellos said that the commission required investment bank JP Morgan to admit the facts in the SEC's order and acknowledge that it broke the law.

According to Politico, the bank also agreed to pay nearly 400 million dollars to settle allegations of illegal credit card billing practices.

The settlement is the result of a trading blow-up that cost the bank 6 billion dollars in losses, first announced in May 2012.

The bank at first said that the losses were the result of trades employed to guard against risk going awry, while critics charged it was making risky trades to boost profits.

Canellos said that the settlement makes clear that JPMorgan's control breakdowns went far beyond the CIO trading book.

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon accepted responsibility for the bank's mistakes from the start and said that they have worked to fix them adding that they will continue to strive towards being considered the best bank.

Apart from the agreements with the SEC, OCC, Federal Reserve and U.K. Financial Conduct Authority, the bank has also agreed to pay 80 million dollars in fines, 60 million dollars to the OCC, and 20 million dollars to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, bringing the total regulatory fines for the day to 1 billion dollars, the report added.