Legal
Former ANZ Trader Drops Lawsuit

A former employee has withdrawn a lawsuit against the Australian bank.
Australia and New Zealand Banking Group confirmed this week that
former employee Etienne Alexiou has withdrawn his legal action
against the bank. The bank has not paid any money to
the man to settle the case, it said.
Each of the parties will pay their legal costs, ANZ said in a
statement.
“The closure of this case means all legal action initiated by
employees who were dismissed in late 2015 for serious breaches of
our code of conduct has been withdrawn. While it’s disappointing
our business and our people have been unfairly subjected to a
series of unfounded claims, ANZ will continue to take an
uncompromising stance to legal disputes of this nature where it
considers them to be without merit,” said Nigel Williams, chief
risk officer at ANZ.
According to media reports, Alexiou’s lawsuit was for A$30
million ($22.9 million). He says he dropped the case to
protect his family rather than because he was not able to win the
lawsuit, media reports said. He was fired in 2015 over “explicit
online chats with other traders and he claimed in his unfair
dismissal case to have been exposed to a culture that was
inconsistent with ANZ's code of conduct,” a report by the
Sydney Morning Herald said.
Alexiou was initially suspended in 2014 as the Australian
Securities and Investments Commission investigated allegations
ANZ had manipulated the bank bill swap rate, the report said.