June 17 (Reuters) - The total amount paid by banks to settlea civil lawsuit related to allegations that traders manipulatedthe currency market has reached almost $2 billion following arecent round of settlement agreements, the Wall Street Journalreported.
HSBC Holdings Plc, Barclays Plc, BNPParibas SA and Goldman Sachs Group Inc haverecently signed agreements to settle the case, the Journalreported, citing people familiar with the matter. (http://on.wsj.com/1GYC888)
HSBC has agreed to pay $285 million and Barclays $375million, the Journal said.
Bank of America Corp settled its portion of currencyrigging lawsuit in April.
JPMorgan Chase & Co settled for $99.5 million inJanuary and Switzerland's UBS Group AG settled for$135 million in March.
Other defendants include Citigroup Inc, Credit SuisseGroup AG, Deutsche Bank AG, Morgan Stanley and Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc.
Investors including the city of Philadelphia, hedge fundsand public pension funds accused the 12 banks of havingconspired since January 2003 in chat rooms, instant messages andemails to manipulate the WM/Reuters Closing Spot Rates.
According to the lawsuit, the banks held an 84 percentglobal market share in currency trading, and were counterpartiesin 98 percent of U.S. spot volume.
HSBC, Barclays, BNP Paribas and Goldman Sachs could not beimmediately reached for comment. (Reporting by Neha Dimri in Bengaluru; Editing by SaumyadebChakrabarty)
Barclays (BARC)
HSBC Holdings (HSBA)
