Barclays has called for the US courts to block energy regulators from collecting 488m dollars of fines for electricity trading market manipulation. Lawyers from the UK bank have argued that the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) was wrong to order the fines as the actions of the Barclays traders were not manipulative. A federal court filing from Barclays' attorney maintained that the traders may well have intended to, and may have contributed to, changing prices but as they did this via trades with counter-parties this did not inherently constitute manipulation.Barclays has also argued that FERC waited too long to file its case and that the lawsuit, if allowed to proceed, should have been filed in New York, according to Bloomberg.Calling for a dismissal of the case, the company has made the legal argument that because the trades in question did not result in the actual physical delivery of electric energy, FERC also lacks authority to bring its lawsuit. In July FERC fined Barclays $488m for engaging in a "coordinated, fraudulent scheme" to "manipulate electricity prices in and around California".Barclays responded that it intended to "vigorously" fight the allegations.Four former Barclays traders were also named by the regulator and fined a total of $18m for taking part in the alleged scheme, with Scott Connelly fined $15m for being the "leader of the manipulative scheme" and its "highest paid member". Three other ex-Barclays energy traders, Daniel Brin, Karen Levine and Ryan Smith, were each fined $1m.OH