James Vorley and Cedric Chanu, former precious metals traders at Deutsche Bank in London, were each sentenced to one year and one day in prison for their respective roles in a scheme to manipulate the precious metals markets with fraudulent trades.

Vorley and Chanu, together with other Deutsche Bank traders, allegedly defrauded market participants through a deceptive trading practice known as “spoofing.” This involved placing numerous fraudulent precious metal orders on exchanges in New York, Singapore, and Hong Kong and canceling them just before execution.

“Specifically, Vorley (and Chanu) placed fraudulent orders … to create the false appearance of supply and demand and to induce other traders to transact at prices, quantities, and times that they otherwise would not have traded,” the Department of Justice stated in separate press releases on each trader’s sentencing.

Vorley was sentenced June 21 after being convicted by a federal jury in the Northern District of Illinois on Sept. 25. Chanu was sentenced June 29 and also convicted Sept. 25.

Deutsche Bank in January agreed to pay more than $130 million in a coordinated resolution between the Department of Justice, Securities and Exchange Commission, and Commodity Futures Trading Commission to resolve charges concerning the spoofing case, as well as for paying bribes to third parties to secure business deals in Asia and the Middle East.

Editor’s note: This story was updated June 30 to reflect Chanu’s sentencing.

Jaclyn Jaeger is a freelance contributor to Compliance Week after working for the company for 15 years. She writes on a wide variety of topics, including ethics and compliance, risk management, legal, enforcement, technology, and more.

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