Jury acquits three ex-Forex traders of market manipulation
Judgment of acquittal was entered as to Richard Usher, Rohan Ramchandani, and Christopher Ashton, on Friday, October 26th.
The trial of former FX traders Richard Usher, Rohan Ramchandani, and Christopher Ashton at the New York Southern District Court has resulted in acquittal of the defendants.
On Friday, October 26th, the Jury returned “not guilty” verdicts for the defendants, clearing them of charges of manipulating the Forex spot market. The three traders are acquitted, discharged and any bond exonerated.
The Jury verdict comes after a couple of weeks of heavy cross-examination of witnesses and requests for striking of testimony and even a motion for declaring a mistrial.
Under the Indictment, from at least as early as December 2007 and continuing at least through January 2013, the defendants and their co-conspirators, participated in a combination and conspiracy to suppress and eliminate competition for the purchase and sale of EUR/USD in the United States and elsewhere by fixing, stabilizing, maintaining, increasing, and decreasing the price of, and rigging bids and offers for, EUR/USD in the FX Spot Market. The combination and conspiracy engaged in by Defendants and their co-conspirators unreasonably restrained interstate and U.S. import trade and commerce in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act.
Usher, former Head of G11 FX Trading-UK at an affiliate of Royal Bank of Scotland plc, as well as former Managing Director at an affiliate of JPMorgan Chase & Co., Ramchandani, former Managing Director and head of G10 FX spot trading at an affiliate of Citicorp, and Ashton, former Head of Spot FX at an affiliate of Barclays PLC, were alleged to have conspired to manipulate the FX market by “coordinating their bidding, offering, and trading” at “certain times.”
The case, captioned USA v. Usher et al (1:17-cr-00019), was officially terminated on October 26, 2018.
