April 28 (Reuters) - Britain's Serious Fraud Office (SFO)said on Monday it had started criminal proceedings against threeformer Barclays Plc employees as part of its ongoinginvestigation into the manipulation of Libor benchmark interestrates.
The SFO said proceedings had been initiated against JayVijay Merchant, Alex Julian Pabon and Ryan Michael Reich forconspiracy to defraud.
The agency said the first court appearance would take placeat Westminster Magistrates Court in a few weeks.
Libor, or the London Interbank Offered Rate, underpinshundreds of trillions of dollars of transactions, and is used toset interest rates on credit cards, student loans and mortgages.
U.S. and European regulators have been probing whether banksartificially depressed Libor rates during the 2008 financialcrisis to appear healthier. (Reporting by Esha Vaish and Karen Rebelo in Bangalore; Editingby Maju Samuel)