Bloomberg provides customers with chat restriction

Bloomberg LP is providing terminal clients with tools to monitor and restrict employees’ access to its chat-room functions, after traders’ use of electronic messages drew scrutiny amid government market-manipulation probes.

Justin Baer of The Wall Street Journal writes, “Bloomberg said Tuesday it had created a new function that allows clients’ compliance officers to monitor employees’ use of the terminal’s chat services from a single screen.

“Starting next month, the media-and-information conglomerate said, banks and other customers will be able to limit how employees can access so-called multi-firm chat rooms, in which more than two participants can congregate and swap messages.

“What passes from one firm to another in chat rooms drew a spotlight this year as regulatory probes into alleged interest-rate rigging and currency market manipulations revealed that traders from rival banks may have used the service to share information inappropriately.”

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