JPMorgan Gold Trader Says Boss Coached Him to Lie About Spoofing

A former JPMorgan Chase & Co. precious-metals trader said his boss coached him to lie to compliance officials about price-manipulating orders and later counseled him against pleading guilty as prosecutors were preparing criminal charges against top executives on the trading desk.

Christian Trunz, who spent more than a decade at JPMorgan, told a Chicago jury that so-called spoof orders he’d placed and quickly canceled for palladium had sparked a four-month probe by bank officials. Trunz said Michael Nowak, the managing director who ran the precious-metals business, advised him to mislead investigators about his intent to execute the trades. …