JPMorgan Chase said Monday it had agreed to pay $297 millions to the US Securities and Exchange Commission to settle a dispute over sale of mortgage-backed securities.

Most of the punishable activity is attributed to Bear Stearns, the New York investment bank that JP Morgan bought urgently in 2008 in a deal organized by the Federal Reserve to prevent the imploding investment bank's losses from pulling down other banks.

Bear Stearns collapsed in 2007-2008, the first major casualty of the financial crash that was rooted in the imploding housing sector.