Businesses began sending employees home quickly after the Covid-19 epidemic began, further taxing a system that was already under strain due to the proliferation of mobile messaging apps. Banks including Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and JPMorgan Chase have already been subject to investigations.
Morgan Stanley made the disclosure in its second-quarter earnings report, stating that the $200 million was “related to a specific regulatory matter concerning the use of unapproved personal devices and the firm’s record-keeping requirements.”
Total non-interest costs came at US$9.71 billion, exceeding experts’ expectations of US$9.53 billion.
The SEC and the CFTC fined JPMorgan in December for violating their rules by using services like WhatsApp or personal email accounts for business-related correspondence. Even managing directors and other senior supervisors at the bank had done this, the regulators said.
Citigroup stated in a filing from February that it was assisting the SEC with their investigation into “communications received across unapproved electronic messaging channels.”
