(Bloomberg) — Morgan Stanley was fined $2 million by a Massachusetts regulator over stock sales by a First Republic executive in the months leading up to the California lender's collapse last year.
Morgan Stanley will pay $2 million to settle the investigation by the Massachusetts Securities Division, according to a spokesman for the regulator.
A Morgan Stanley representative said the bank was pleased to have resolved the matter. The news was reported earlier by the Wall Street Journal.
The Justice Department was looking into stock trading by some First Republic Bank employees during the lender's collapse, Bloomberg reported last May. The department was looking into whether anyone working at the firm used inside information in the transactions as it was reeling from the second-biggest failure in US banking history before it was bought by JPMorgan Chase & Co.