Oil major BP Plc faces fines in excess of $300 million to settle civil and criminal probes related to market manipulation charges and a Texas refinery explosion that killed 15 workers in 2005.
The London-based company will pay $303 million to settle civil charges that it tried to manipulate propane prices in the United States by cornering the market in February 2004, a source familiar with the matter said late on Tuesday.
The world's third-largest non-government controlled oil company by market capitalisation is also close to settling charges that it was criminally indifferent to worker safety, contributing to the Texas blast, the New York Times reported on Wednesday, citing government officials.
BP has agreed to plead guilty to criminal environmental charges and pay $50 million to settle a U.S. federal investigation into the deadly 2005 explosion, newswire Dow Jones said, citing people familiar with the situation.
Safety regulators said cost cuts were partly to blame for the Texas City blast.
BP declined to comment on the cases. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) refused to comment on a settlement of the market manipulation charges it had brought.
(Reuters)