Seven banks—including Bank of America Corp., Barclays Bank Plc,and Citigroup Inc.—agreed to pay $324 million to settle claims theyconspired to rig the ISDAfix benchmark, which is used in the saleof interest-rate derivatives and other financial instruments.

The settlements follow a ruling by U.S. District Judge JesseFurman in Manhattan rejecting the banks' request that he throw outthe claims. Furman said in March that a group of investors led byan Alaska pension fund had raised “plausible allegations that aconspiracy among the defendants existed” and allowed the suit to goforward.

The investors claimed that, beginning in 2009, the banks usedelectronic chat rooms and other means of private communication toset ISDAfix, typically submitting identical rate quotes, investorssaid in their suit. They were seeking billions of dollars in lossestied to the alleged rate-fixing scheme.