LONDON (AP) — Britain's financial services regulator fined and banned a Morgan Stanley trader yesterday for putting customers at a disadvantage by pre-hedging trades without their consent — the third sanction linked to the bank in the last two weeks.

The Financial Services Authority said senior trader Nilesh Shroff used the technique, which takes advantage of customer orders to benefit a trading firm, on a number of occasions in the second half of 2007.

When clients told him to buy particular stocks, he bought those stocks for the firm first, causing the price to increase before he executed the customers' trades. If the customer order was to sell, he first sold on behalf of the firm, decreasing the price.

"(Shroff) repeatedly abused his position of responsibility as a senior trader," the FSA said in a statement, fining him £140,000 ($224,000).

"As an experienced trader, he would also have known that his orders were likely to disadvantage his clients," Margaret Cole, the FSA's director of enforcement, said.