us bank in 515m sec settlement five bank of america subsidiaries have agreed to pay a total of 515m 277m to settle an investigation into fraudulent trading share practices the us securities and exchange commission announced the settlements the latest in an industrywide cleanup of us mutual funds the sec also said it had brought fraud charges against two exsenior executives of columbia distributor columbia distributor was part of fleetboston bought by boa last year three other excolumbia executives agreed settlements with the sec the sec has set itself the task of stamping out the mutual funds use of markettiming a form of quickfire shortterm share trading that harms the interests of small investors with whom mutual funds are particularly popular in the last two years it has imposed penalties totalling nearly 2bn on 15 funds the sec unveiled two separate settlements one covering boa s direct subsidiaries and another for businesses that were part of fleetboston at the time in both cases it said there had been secret deals to engage in market timing in mutual fund shares the sec agreed a deal totalling 375m with banc of america capital management bacap distributors and banc of america securities it was made up of 250m to pay back gains from market timing and 125m in penalties it is to be paid to the damaged funds and their shareholders separately the sec said it had reached a 140m deal equally split between penalties and compensation in its probe into columbia management advisors cam and columbia funds distributor cfd and three excolumbia executives these businesses became part of boa when it snapped up rival bank fleetboston in a 47bn merger last march the sec filed civil fraud charges in a boston federal court against james tambone who it says headed cfd s sales operations and his alleged second in command robert hussey the sec is pressing for the highest tier of financial penalties against the pair for multiple violations repayment of any personal gains and an injunction to prevent future breaches a spokeswoman for the sec s boston office told the bbc there was no immediate comment from the men s lawyers the sec s settlement with cam and cfd included agreements with three other exmanagers peter martin erik gustafson and joseph palombo who paid personal financial penalties of between 50100 000