Liability, awards and settlements

27.7, anti-trust settlement

US: Visa International, MasterCard, and banks including Citigroup agreed to pay $336mn to their customers to settle antitrust lawsuits over currency conversion fees charged on foreign transactions. MasterCard will pay $72.5mn as its share of the settlement, it said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Bank of America Corp, JPMorgan Chase & Co’s Bank One Corp and Chase Manhattan Bank, and Washington Mutual Inc. are also defendants in the case. Settlement was reached following years of litigation. The suits involved claims that the credit card companies failed to disclose fees of up to 3% on purchases made in foreign currencies. The accord is subject to approval by a federal judge in New York.