South African Antitrust Body Refuses to Release Rand Probe Records
- Commission says improper for tribunal to ask it to give record
- Standard Bank says Competition Commission ‘can’t play games’
A vendor counts out rand banknotes while working in an African craft market in the Rosebank district of Johannesburg, South Africa, on Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2015. More than four years of currency declines -- to a fresh low this week -- aren't enough to offset electricity shortages, strikes and slowing demand from Asia and Europe that are pushing the economy to the brink of recession.
Photographer: Waldo Swiegers/BloombergSouth Africa’s Competition Commission has declined Standard Bank Group Ltd.’s request to release details of its investigation into currency manipulation.
The refusal is the latest chapter in a saga that started in May 2015, when the commission alleged that firms including JPMorgan Chase & Co., BNP Paribas SA and Standard Chartered Plc colluded to rig the value of the rand. The inquiry followed a global probe into manipulation of the currency market that began in the U.K. two years earlier.