OCC Will Not Review JPM, Citi Charters in Wake of Criminal Plea

WASHINGTON — The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has no plans to review the charters of JPMorgan Chase or Citicorp following their agreement to plead guilty to criminal charges related to currency rigging, according to Comptroller Thomas Curry.

The banking agencies generally keep convicted criminals away from banks, but this marks the first time a domestic institution itself has been found guilty of a crime. In some cases, such a finding would trigger a review of the institution's charter. 

But asked about the issue by a reporter this week, Curry said a review would only take place if the crime were related to money laundering violations.

"You're referring to the charter revocation provisions under federal law but they're limited to very specific statutes dealing with criminal money laundering," Curry said. "Any other violation would not trigger that statute. It really has to be a particular section … again in terms of some of our institutions we did deal with this issue on an administrative basis a couple of months ago.

"From our standpoint, at the bank level, we addressed it earlier at the issue of civil money penalties as well," Curry added.

The OCC settled accusations in November with JPMorgan, Citigroup and Bank of America that they manipulated foreign exchange trading in a deal that involved a combined $950 million in penalties. 

The Justice Department announced Wednesday that Citi, JPMorgan, Barclays and Royal Bank of Scotland had agreed to plead guilty to manipulating the price of U.S. dollars and euros. Justice and the Federal Reserve Board announced fines against those four banks, while the central bank also fined Bank of America, which did not plead guilty.

All told, the banks involved have paid roughly $9 billion in fines.

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