The U.S. Federal Reserve this month asked nine banks that were part of stress tests conducted earlier this year to submit plans to repay money injected under the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), Bloomberg said, citing a person familiar with the situation.

The banks may be allowed to repay the TARP money soon if they have been able to raise common equity recently and would continue to exceed capital buffers that were set in the stress tests, the news agency cited the person as saying.

The Federal Reserve did not immediately return a Reuters email seeking comment that was sent outside of regular U.S. business hours.

The Federal Reserve Board said earlier this month that nine of 10 large banks ordered to raise capital in May had met or exceeded their goals, with the exception of GMAC LLC.

(Reporting by Ajay Kamalakaran in Bangalore; Editing by Kim Coghill)

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