Deutsche Bank agreed on Tuesday to pay $553.6m and admitted criminal wrongdoing to settle a long-running probe over fraudulent tax shelters that allowed clients to avoid paying billions of dollars in US taxes.

Under a non-prosecution agreement with the US Attorney's office in Manhattan and the Internal Revenue Service, the German bank won't be prosecuted for its participation in about 15 tax shelters involving more than 2,100 customers between 1996 and 2002, including shelters marketed by accounting firm KPMG and defunct law firm Jenkens & Gilchrist.