US lender JP Morgan Chase Bank has been fined S$2.4 million (~US$1.78 million, ~RM8.0 million) by Singapore's central bank for failing to prevent and detect misconduct of the group's relationship managers, reported Reuters on Monday.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) said JP Morgan's relationship managers provided inaccurate or incomplete information to clients in 24 instances of over-the-counter (OTC) bond transactions, charging higher rates for spreads, the differences between the buying or bidding price and that of the selling or asking price more than five years ago.

Local media The Straits Times said in an online rerpot that the manipulated bond transactions took place between November 2018 and September 2019, adding that investigations conducted by MAS found that for the OTC bond transactions, the bank's practice was to charge clients a spread over the interbank prices. As the interbank prices were not available to clients, they had to rely on the represenation of JP Morgan Chase's relationship managers, the report said.

MAS said in a statement that JPMorgan Chase did not have adequate processes and controls to ensure that relationship managers adhered to pre-agreed spreads with clients.

The Singaporean financial regulatory body disclosed that JP Morgan had admitted the liability for its failure to prevent or detect the misconduct and had paid MAS the civil penalty, and had refunded the overcharged fees to affected clients.

JP Morgan Chase said in a statement, "In 2020, after completing our internal review, JPMorgan Private Bank undertook a comprehensive update to its internal controls, monitoring and training framework to ensure our trade governance, pricing transparency and compliance principles continue to be upheld."