The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced settlements with U.S. Bank and Oppenheimer & Co. for admitted recordkeeping and supervision failures regarding employee use of off-channel communications for conducting business.
U.S. Bank agreed to pay a $6 million penalty, while Oppenheimer was fined $1 million.
Both firms’ violations dated back to 2019 and included instances of noncompliance among senior leaders and supervisory personnel responsible for ensuring compliance, the CFTC said in its press release Tuesday. These occurred despite the firms having in place policies and procedures to prevent business-related communications through unapproved means.
Last month, Oppenheimer was fined $12 million by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as part of an off-channel communications enforcement sweep that caught 16 broker-dealers and investment advisers. Also among those penalized was a U.S. Bank affiliate, U.S. Bancorp Investments, which agreed to pay $8 million.
The SEC and CFTC’s combined crackdown on recordkeeping failures by financial services firms regarding employee use of off-channel communications for business purposes has so far resulted in nearly $3 billion in penalties against firms and their affiliates. Firms have largely admitted their violations and committed to undertake remedial actions in reaching settlement.
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