The Bank of England has seen no evidence to back media allegations that it condoned or was aware of manipulation of reference rates in the foreign exchange market, it said yesterday.

The central bank discussed with top London currency dealers their process for setting foreign exchange benchmark rates at a meeting in April 2012, more than a year before a global investigation into alleged manipulation.

Online chatrooms
Two sources with knowledge of the meeting said last month that the traders had told the central bank about the use of online chatrooms in the run-up to the daily currency rate setting.

However, Andrew Bailey, the bank’s deputy governor and chief executive of the bank’s prudential regulation authority, told the British parliament’s treasury select committee yesterday it had no evidence to suggest that bank officials in any sense condoned the manipulation of the rate-setting process.

“We have no evidence yet, and we have not seen the evidence that was in the Bloomberg report,” he added.

Bloomberg News said on February 7th that Bank of England officials told currency traders at the meeting that it was not improper to share impending customer orders with counterparts at other firms.

A senior trader gave his notes from the meeting to the financial conduct authority, Bloomberg said. – (Reuters)