The FCA and the PRA have imposed fines totalling over £60m on Citigroup Global Markets Limited (CGML) for failures in its trading systems and controls between April 2018 and May 2022.
The FCA, which fined CGML £27,766,200, and the PRA, which imposed a £33,880,000 penalty, conducted their investigations in parallel. The most significant trading incident occurred when a trader inputting error led to a basket of equities to the value of US$444bn being created, rather than the intended US$58m. Whilst CGML controls blocked US$255bn of the basket progressing, the remaining US$189bn was sent to a trading algorithm, and US$1.4bn of equities were sold across European exchanges before the trader cancelled the order.
Poor design meant the trader could override pop-ups alerting them to the amount, and slow real-time monitoring did not escalate alerts about the trades effectively enough to stop the process.
The FCA found CGML had breached Principles 2 and 3 as well as Rule 7A.3.2 of MAR, and the
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