A senior HSBC Holdings Plc executive pleaded not guilty on Monday to charges that he participated in a fraudulent scheme to front-run a $3.5 billion currency transaction by one of the bank's clients.
The plea on wire fraud and conspiracy charges by Mark Johnson, a British citizen who at the time of his arrest last month was HSBC's global head of foreign exchange cash trading, was entered by his lawyer in federal court in Brooklyn.
"He pleaded not guilty because he is not guilty," Frank Wohl, the lawyer, said after the hearing. "He's done nothing wrong."
Johnson and Stuart Scott, HSBC's former head of cash trading for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, are believed to be the first people to face US criminal charges arising from a probe of foreign-exchange rigging at banks.
The probe led to four banks last year pleading guilty to conspiring to manipulate currency prices. HSBC was not among those banks, but in 2014 agreed to pay $618 million to resolve related probes by US and British regulators.