Former Barclays FX trading head indicted on front-running charges

Robert Bogucki, former head of Barclays Capital's New York foreign-exchange trading operations, was indicted by a federal grand jury in San Jose, Calif., on charges of front-running £6 billion ($8.14 billion) in foreign-exchange options.

Mr. Bogucki faces one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and six counts of wire fraud, according to the indictment filed Tuesday.

The charges concern an FX transaction made by Barclays on behalf of Hewlett-Packard related to the firm's acquisition of U.K.-based Autonomy in 2011, according to the indictment. From August to October 2011, Mr. Bogucki and other Barclays employees allegedly used the confidential information they received from Hewlett-Packard to manipulate the price of "volatility," a metric that affects the value of foreign-exchange options, the indictment said.

Mr. Bogucki misled Hewlett-Packard and its employees about Barclays' activities and the state of the options market, to his and Barclays' benefit, the Justice Department said in a separate news release. "Specifically, the indictment alleges that (Mr.) Bogucki directed options trading in a way that was designed to depress the price of volatility, to the benefit of Barclays and at HP's expense," according to the release.

Barclays has paid a total of $1.55 billion to settle charges of FX manipulation made by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority and the New York Department of Financial Services.