Citigroup Fined for Unfair Bond Pricing

FINRA fined Citigroup Global Markets Inc. for buying municipal bonds and corporate bonds for its own account from customers and/or selling municipal bonds and corporate bonds for its own account to customers at unfair and unreasonable prices. This type of bond fraud has been on FINRA's radar screen lately, as it has fined numerous brokerage firms for charging excessive markups and markdowns to investors. This appears to be a widespread practice among brokerage firms, as brokerage firms typically have not told investors how much they were being charged for bond trades.