Spain's high court has officially placed Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA under formal investigation over wiretapping allegations, Bloomberg News reported.

The investigating judge accepted Spain's anti-corruption prosecutor's request to the high court in the week of July 22 to formally investigate the lender. The bank will be investigated for alleged bribery and corruption, the news source said.

BBVA has been conducting its own investigation into the allegations since June 2018. The claims became public in January after two Spanish websites reported that BBVA had paid large sums of money in 2004 to a security company to spy on executives and government officials who favored a takeover of the lender.