The Wall Street Journal reported that large lenders were thinking of disabling chat rooms online that serve to link traders to various financial companies. Citing sources, the report said the plan to block traders from chat rooms came as regulators heightened their probe of the banks. The report said some of the forums in the chat rooms were viewed by regulators as potentials places were collusion and market manipulation could occur. This concern prompted banks like Credit Suisse Group, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup Inc to review how these chat rooms were used. Other lenders like the Royal Bank of Scotland Group, UBS and Barclays were also looking into their standards on how all electronic communications were controlled and monitored, the sources added.

According to the WSJ report, traders have relied on chat rooms to get in touch with each other and with their clients. Multidealer chat rooms serve to link traders of currencies, equities, fixed income assets and commodities to various banks and their clients mainly through their Bloomberg terminals.

However, regulatory investigations on allegations of the rigging of interest rates and market manipulation have caused regulators to focus on chat rooms. The report said some lenders were thinking of overhauling how traders do business as they face the possibility of damaging their reputations. They also face huge fines should the allegations be proven.

The Justice Department had said that its antitrust division was also conducting investigations about possible market manipulation. According to the report, this hinted that the information shared among traders could have obstructed fair market competition.

The WSJ's sources said the probes had to with chat rooms which had names like the "The Cartel." Earlier this month, the Journal also reported that regulators had seen messages where traders exchanged jokes about their ability to influence the currency exchange rates.