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 Perry Stimpson, a former Citigroup currency trader who is claiming
unfair dismissal, said the practices, which breached client
confidentiality, were well known by senior managers.
"Our Investor Desk would comply with a weekly request from (a
client) for details of Central Bank activity that Citi had
transacted," Stimpson said in his witness statement to an employment
tribunal in London. Stimpson did not specify which central banks he
was referring to.
He said Jeff Feig, who was Citi's global head of trading at the
time, called a halt to sending round the "central bank survey", as
Stimpson said it was referred to, in mid-2013 because he decided it
was wrong. He did not elaborate.
Feig was not immediately available for comment.
"Another common practice on the Investor Desk was to cut and paste
details of Citibank's order book on to Bloomberg chats at the
request of customers," Stimpson said in his statement.
A Citi spokesman said: "All of the allegations of wrongdoing being
made by Mr Stimpson have been investigated and were found to be
without merit."Citi has said Stimpson was dismissed for serious
breaches of contract, alleging he shared confidential client
information with traders at other banks via electronic chatrooms.
He was dismissed last November in the wake of an industry scandal
that resulted in banks paying more than $10 billion in fines for
failing to stop traders attempting to manipulate the $5
trillion-a-day forex market.
Stimpson, who described himself as "moderately successful" at his
job and "quite anti-social", was strongly encouraged to gather and
share more market information with colleagues and traders at other
banks, he claimed, in order to have a broader understanding of
market conditions to help the bank in its trading.
Maintaining contacts to gather information became one of his annual
goals that would help dictate his year-end bonuses.
"Dude, get yourself on a chat," his then line manager Bob de Groot
told him in 2009, according to Stimpson's statement.
"Perry has made a good effort to talk to other participants in the
market, he could give a little more effort in sharing information
and ideas across the business," is what de Groot wrote in his 2009
year-end review, Stimpson claimed in his statement.
De Groot left Citi in early 2010. De Groot was not immediately
available to comment.
STIR IT UP
In his testimony, Stimpson said Citigroup staff breached
confidentiality around some clients and that some senior staff used
inside information to trade, in contravention of the bank's own code
of conduct.
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In his witness statement, Stimpson said Michael Plavnik, then head
of the short-term interest rate trading desk, looked to profit from
trading euros around that day's "fixing", the daily process of
setting what are effectively benchmark exchange rates used by many
funds, companies and central banks around the world.
Plavnik had heard Citi's spot FX desk had a large order to buy euros
at the fix. Armed with that knowledge, he bought 200 million euros
before the fix to sell them back into the market at the fixing rate,
Stimpson claimed in his statement.
"Plavnik has not been found to have committed any misconduct," a
Citi spokesman told Reuters.
Plavnik, who has since been promoted to global head of short-term
interest rate trading, did not immediately respond to an email
requesting comment.
Earlier this week, Stimpson told the tribunal that senior Citi staff
traded on insider information ahead of a major merger and
acquisition deal five years ago which netted the bank $35 million.
Citigroup's lawyer Diya Sen Gupta told the court on Thursday: "The
allegations were investigated and are not, and were not,
substantiated."
Stimpson, who is representing himself, admitted that he had signed
Citi codes of conduct, which covered a wide range of issues from
ethics to client confidentiality, but barely paid any attention to
their content.
The hearing will extend into next week, and Stimpson is expected to
testify again and bring his own witnesses on Friday.
(Reporting by Jamie McGeever; Editing by Susan Thomas)
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