Credit Suisse Group AG has agreed to pay $81 million to settle its portion of a federal class-action lawsuit filed by three U.S. public pension funds alleging that six major investment banks colluded to overcharge investors and maintain control of the $1.72 trillion stock loan market.
The suit, filed in 2017, accused Credit Suisse along with Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and UBS of violating antitrust law by conspiring to overcharge investors and obstructing efforts to create competitive electronic exchanges for securities lending, according to the original court documents.
According to settlement documents filed Feb. 11 in U.S. District Court in New York, Credit Suisse has "denied and continue to deny specifically each and all of the claims and contentions of wrongful conduct alleged in the action."
The lawsuit had alleged the banks colluded to block the development of competitive exchange platforms, and have done so since 2009 through a securities lending platform the banks created called EquiLend. The lawsuit alleged the banks had created the platform to prevent access to other marketplaces to obtain better prices on stock lending.
The suit had been filed in U.S. District Court in New York by the $42.9 billion Iowa Public Employees' Retirement System, Des Moines; $21.5 billion Orange County Employees Retirement System, Santa Ana; and $3.4 billion Sonoma County Employees' Retirement Association, Santa Rosa, Calif.
The law firms of Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll and Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan represent the pension funds. Daniel L. Brockett, partner at Quinn Emanuel, said the pension funds are still pursuing litigation against the five other banks.
