SEC Sees “Rampant” Insider Trading on Wall Street
October 26th, 2007Via: Reuters:
A senior Securities and Exchange Commission official said on Thursday insider trading appeared to be “rampant” among Wall Street professionals and the agency has formed a working group to focus on it.
“I believe we’re going to see more insider trading cases,” Linda Chatman Thomsen, the SEC’s enforcement director, told reporters on the sidelines of a securities fraud conference.
“I am disappointed in the number of cases we are seeing by people who make an abundant livelihood in the market that they are sort of abusing by insider trading,” Thomsen said, referring to cases already brought against professionals this year.
Insider trading “appears to be rampant” among Wall Street securities professionals, she added.
Alice Fisher, assistant attorney general with the Justice Department’s criminal division, echoed Thomsen’s sentiment and said: “The number of insider trading cases don’t seem to be going away.”
In the past year, SEC enforcement lawyers have brought increasing numbers of insider trading lawsuits and settlements. Recent high-profile cases include charges against a husband and wife in Hong Kong for trades in Dow Jones & Co Inc shares ahead of News Corp’s $5 billion takeover bid, and guilty pleas from three former Countrywide Financial Corp executives for trading company shares ahead of a disappointing profit report.
Also, in March U.S. prosecutors charged 13 people, including employees at top Wall Street banks UBS, Morgan Stanley and Bear Stearns Cos Inc in what they called one of the most pervasive trading rings since the 1980s. The SEC also brought civil charges against 11 people, as well as against three hedge funds.
[Ted Baxter]In other breaking news, the Sun rises in the east and sets in the west![/TB]