UBS, Barclays Bank, Citibank, JPMorgan, and NatWest Markets (formerly The Royal Bank of Scotland)

All persons or entities, during January 1, 2008 and October 15, 2013, that engaged in foreign exchange transactions:

1. Which were arranged in Australia, either because you were located in Australia (either directly or indirectly through an agent) or because the bank or financial institution that you arranged them through was located in Australia; and
2. The total value of your transactions in the affected currencies during this period exceeded AUD $500,000.

Eligibility criteria includes trading FX spots and/or outright forwards in Affected Currency Pairs between January 1,  2008 and October 15, 2013, that were arranged in Australia (directly or indirectly through an agent) and the total value of the transactions exceeded AUD $500,000.

Affected Currency Pairs means: AUD, GBP, EUR, JPY, NZD, or the USD, paired with most other major world currencies (approximately 28).

Traders do not need to have traded with one of the Respondent Banks to be eligible to register.

It is alleged that the respondent banks engaged in cartel conduct that artificially influenced the prices of FX Instruments during the Relevant Period, causing financial loss to group members. Specifically, it is claimed that the banks reached agreements or understandings to cooperate in trading FX Instruments by sharing non-public information and coordinating their trading activities and the prices at which these instruments were offered. This conduct allegedly aimed to fix, control, or maintain FX Instrument prices, resulting in losses for the Applicant and group members. The banks are accused of sharing information on customer order types and attributes, planned trading activities, and customer spreads, and coordinating trades in advance of customer orders to manipulate currency prices to their advantage. The respondent banks deny these allegations and are defending the proceedings.

This alleged cartel conduct has been the subject of extensive regulatory and private enforcement actions, including class actions in the United States and Canada, which have resulted in settlements totaling over USD $2.3 billion and CAD $107 million, respectively.

Australian FX Cartel Class Action

Class action filed by Maurice Blackburn that alleges illegal cartel conduct in the FX market from January 1, 2008 to October 15, 2013.

Registration Deadline: 8/11/24; law firm is currently looking to identify claims eligible clients and total notational. No data needed yet.

According to the Law firm’s website, the complaint alleges that for affected currencies this resulted in the manipulation of:

1. Foreign exchange benchmark rates;
2. The pricing of “spreads”, which is the difference between the price at which given currencies can be bought and the price at which they can be sold on the foreign exchange market; and
3. The triggering of client stop loss orders and limit orders and other manipulative conduct.