Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay a $2.5 million fine to settle Finra allegations that the firm failed to report large options positions.
In a settlement agreement made public Monday, Finra alleged that the firm did not report or inaccurately reported options positions in 21.1 million instances, from January 19, 2010, through July 7, 2016.
Industry rules require daily reporting of accounts with 200 or more options positions in a particular security. Reporting is done through the Large Options Positions Reporting system (LOPR), which is run by the Options Clearing Corp.
“LOPR data is used extensively by self-regulatory organizations to identify holders of large options positions who may be attempting to manipulate the market or otherwise violate securities rules and regulations,” Finra said in the settlement.
Finra claimed that Goldman Sachs also failed to report a “potentially significant but an unknown amount of positions in an unknown amount of instances” due to rejected reports that were not resubmitted, and exceeded position limits in three different securities.
Goldman Sachs did not admit or deny the charges.
Finra said the firm self-reported a “significant number” of the reporting violations, cooperated with the investigation and took remedial measures.
A Goldman Sachs spokeswoman declined comment.
Finra will keep $1,425,000 of the total fine and share the rest with the Bats BZX exchange, the Nasdaq ISE exchange and the Nasdaq PHLX exchange.