At least 6 banks in settlement talks with Swiss over Libor -Bloomberg

ZURICH (Reuters) - At least six banks involved in a Swiss investigation of alleged Libor interest rate-rigging are in settlement talks, Bloomberg reported on Friday, citing two people familiar with the negotiations.

Switzerland's competition body COMCO wants to reach a settlement with the banks and is looking to complete the probe by July, Bloomberg said. In 2012 COMCO announced its investigation into possible collusion among traders to influence the London Interbank Offered rate (Libor) - a key benchmark interest rate used to set prices for trillions of dollars of assets - and Tibor, its Japanese counterpart.

Olivier Schaller, COMCO vice-director in charge of the Libor investigation, declined to comment on the Bloomberg report but said he hoped the case would be finished this year.

Twelve banks including UBS (UBSG.VX), Credit Suisse (CSGN.VX), Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE) and HSBC (HSBA.L) were the original targets of the investigation, with another four added in 2013, Schaller said.

Bloomberg did not name the banks in settlement talks.

UBS, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank and HSBC declined to comment on the report.

UBS has previously disclosed that COMCO had granted it conditional immunity in connection with potential competition law violations related to submissions and transactions for Swiss franc Libor.

(Reporting by Joshua Franklin; Additional reporting by Kathrin Jones and Huw Jones; Editing by Adrian Croft)