LONDON, July 25 (Reuters) - Britain's Lloyds Banking Group confirmed on Friday that it was close to agreeing asettlement over allegations of manipulating benchmark interestrates.
"LBG confirms that it is in late-stage settlement discussionswith a number of agencies," the bank said in statement.
Two sources familiar with the talks told Reuters late onThursday that Lloyds would announce a fine next week inconnection with a global scandal over the fixing of the LondonInterbank Offered Rate.
One source said the settlement, which will be the seventhjoint UK and U.S. penalty in this inquiry, could be in theballpark of 200 million to 300 million pounds. (Reporting by Carmel Crimmins, editing by William Hardy)
Lloyds (LLOY)