Goldman Sachs fined by British financial watchdog

The British operation of US banking giant Goldman Sachs has been fined ₤17.5 million pounds ($26.9 million) by a financial watchdog in London, the authority said on Thursday.

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) said the US investment group was fined for failing to tell the FSA that one of its traders was under investigation in the US when he took up a job at the bank’s London office in 2008.

The man, named as Fabrice Tourre, was at the centre of claims that the bank misled buyers of complex mortgage-backed investments in 2007, when the US housing market crisis began. The FSA described the fine as the second-biggest in its history.