Senior officials of the $63bn US money market fund whose implosion last September helped deepen the global financial crisis were charged with fraud on Tuesday by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Bruce Bent Sr, who founded the Primary Reserve fund in 1970; his son, Bruce Bent II; and their company, Resrv Partners, were accused by the SEC of hiding or failing to provide key facts to investors and trustees in the two days after Lehman Brothers sought bankruptcy protection on September 15.