The Bank of Nova Scotia has agreed to pay more than $127 million US in fines to settle criminal investigations into a price manipulation scheme in the price of precious metals that some of its traders were engaged in.

The bank has agreed to a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) to settle separate probes by the Department of Justice and the U.S. commodities regulator, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

According to an agreed upon statement of facts, between January 2008 and July 2016, four precious metals traders employed by Scotia in New York, London and Hong Kong made bogus trades to try to manipulate the price of gold, silver, platinum and palladium futures contracts.

The traders “attempted to rig precious metals futures prices in their favour by placing thousands of orders they knew they would cancel before the trades were executed,” U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito said, describing a financial practice known as “spoofing.”

“In this way, they sought to illegally manipulate the market to their own advantage and to the disadvantage of other traders.”

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