The Securities and Exchange Commission charged AXA Rosenberg Group and two of its units with allegedly hiding an error in a computer model used to manage client assets, in the SEC's first case involving a coding snafu at a quantitative investment manager.

The programming error, which drove $217m (€160m) in client losses, was introduced in 2007 and went undetected for more than two years, according to an administrative order issued by the SEC yesterday.