Macquarie Bank Fine - $4.995M - Marking the Close - ASIC - Sep 24

 

QUICK FACTS

  • Macquarie Fine Amount: $4,995,000 million (AUD)

  • Date: 25 September 2024

  • Violation Period: January - September 2022

  • Primary Violation: Marking the Close


Macquarie ASIC Fine Overview

Following an ASIC investigation, the Markets Disciplinary Panel (MDP) has imposed a financial penalty on Macquarie Bank Limited for failing to prevent suspicious orders in the electricity futures market. As the largest participant in energy derivatives (controlling approximately 58% of electricity futures orders), Macquarie allowed three clients to place orders that potentially manipulated daily settlement prices over a nine-month period in 2022. 


Details of the Macquarie Fine

Surveillance System Failure

Macquarie's primary trade surveillance tool (Nasdaq SMARTS) contained a coding error that prevented it from triggering alerts for suspicious trading activity. The market close time for electricity futures was incorrectly hardcoded as 16:30 instead of 16:00, meaning suspicious end-of-day trading activity went undetected.

 

Pattern of Suspicious Trading

Macquarie's suspicious activity followed a consistent pattern:

  • Orders were placed within the last minute of market close

  • Trading impacted the daily settlement price

  • Price movements favored the clients' existing positions

  • Impact on daily settlement prices ranged from 0.3% to 26.7%

  • Individual client positions benefited between $10,762 and $4,274,688 per day

 

Specific Instances of Market Abuse

Client One (via Third Party Broker) - 12 January 2022:

  • Placed order 14 seconds before market close

  • Sold at $47, $1.85 lower than last traded price

  • Impacted Daily Settlement Price by -3.09%

  • Client benefited by: $405,000

Client Two - 27 June 2022:

  • Placed two orders three and four seconds before close

  • First order: Sold at $305, $16 lower than last traded price

  • Second order: Sold at $245, $10 lower than last traded price

  • Combined impact on daily settlement prices ranged from -2.49% to -3.54%

  • Client benefited by: $4,274,688

Client Three - 8 September 2022:

  • Placed four orders 13 seconds before close, all with significant price increases:

    • PNH5: $5.28 higher than last traded (+2.95%)

    • PNM5: $18.40 higher than last traded (+11.68%)

    • PNU5: $20.86 higher than last traded (+11.33%)

    • PNZ5: $19.81 higher than last traded (+10.81%)

  • Client benefited by: $122,237

 


Timeline 

  • January-February 2022: First client placed initial suspicious orders

  • February 2022: ASIC first alerted Macquarie about suspicious trading

  • May-June 2022: Second wave of suspicious orders from first client

  • June 2022: Second client began placing suspicious orders

  • September 2022: Third client placed 21 suspicious orders

  • October 2022: Macquarie finally implemented an interim surveillance measure


Macquarie Asic Fines and Penalties

The MDP structured the $4,995,000 million penalty across three periods of misconduct:

  • First Period (Jan-Feb 2022): $666,000

  • Second Period (May-June 2022): $1,887,000

  • Third Period (Sept 2022): $2,442,000


Sources: 

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