The Commission welcomes the decision of the Competition Tribunal to deny the Standard Bank’s application to compel the Commission to produce its investigation record.

This follows an application brought by Standard Bank to the Tribunal to force the Commission to release the record within five days of the order. This is after the Commission refused to provide the bank with the record of its investigation before discovery, that is before Standard Bank  has filed its plea to the charge.

The Commission argued that the application be dismissed as it is procedurally flawed as Standard Bank should have brought an application to review the Commission’s decision to refuse it with access to the record. The Tribunal disagreed with the Commission on this point and ruled in favour of Standard Bank that their application to compel production of record was properly brought before it.

The Commission also argued, in the alternative, that the reasonable time to give Standard Bank access to the record of investigation will be at the discovery stage (that is, after Standard Bank has file its answer to the charges against it)  while Standard Bank argued that the reasonable time is 5 days after the Tribunal decision on this application.

On this point, the Tribunal agreed with the Commission and ruled in its favour that the reasonable time to give Standard Bank access to the record of the investigation is at the discovery stage (that is, after Standard Bank and all the banks have filed their answers to the charges against them).

This ruling means that Standard Bank cannot have access to the Commission’s record of investigation until it has filed its answer to the charges against it.

In February the Commission referred a collusion case to the Tribunal for prosecution against Bank of America Merrill Lynch International Limited,  BNP Paribas, JP Morgan Chase & Co, JP Morgan Chase Bank N.A, Investec Ltd, Standard New York Securities Inc., HSBC Bank Plc, Standard Chartered Bank, Credit Suisse Group; Standard Bank of South Africa Ltd, Commerzbank AG; Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Limited, Nomura International Plc., Macquarie Bank Limited, ABSA Bank Limited (ABSA), Barclays Capital Inc, Barclays Bank plc.

The Commission reached a settlement agreement with Citibank N.A. for being part of the forex trading cartel and the bank paid an administrative penalty of R69 500 860 (Sixty Nine Million Five Hundred Thousand Eight Hundred and Sixty Rands).

The rest of the fourteen banks have raised  legal objections and they are set down for hearing from 24 to 26th January. The Standard Bank application is one of the legal objections that banks filed after the Commission referred the case against them to the Tribunal for prosecution.

 

Issued by Competition Commission South Africa