Australia’s ANZ to probe allegations of inflated bond trades, CEO tells staff

(Reuters) – Australia’s ANZ Group plans to “get to the bottom” of allegations of misconduct that have been raised against its bond trading operations and will hold people accountable for any wrongdoing, its CEO said in an email to staff.

The email, a copy of which has been reviewed by Reuters, comes after media reported that the lender had overstated the value of government bonds that it traded by more than A$50 billion ($33.81 billion), during a one year period.

Chief Executive Officer Shayne Elliott and Group Executive, Institutional Mark Whelan admitted to staff that the fundamental allegations were not “new”.

The company has hired external lawyers to help the investigations into the claims and improve workplace culture at the operations headed by Whelan, according to the email.

“As we have said publicly, we are co-operating fully with our regulators and we will systematically get to the bottom of these issues,” Elliott and Whelan wrote in the email.

An ANZ spokesperson declined to respond to a question by Reuters about whether the A$50 billion figure was accurate.

The country’s corporate watchdog, Australian Securities and Investments Commission, has been investigating the bank’s 10-year treasury sale last year and has denied publicly commenting on the bond trade allegations.

ANZ has told the Australian Office of Financial Management that the data of the government bond sales was incorrect, the Australian Financial Review reported on Thursday.

($1 = 1.4789 Australian dollars)