The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) obtained a final consent judgment against Robert Del Prete, a 38-year-old resident of Brick, New Jersey and former SPAC accounting consultant, for insider trading in the stock of HighCape Capital Acquisition Corp. The SEC Complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, charges...Read More

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) obtained a final judgment against Shaohua (Michael) Yin, a Chinese National, and partner at a Hong Kong-based private equity firm, for insider trading using five nominee accounts from addresses in Beijing and Palo Alto, California, as well as on a computer that also accessed Yin’s email accounts. The...Read More

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently settled charges against Philip Markin, a resident of Weehawken, New Jersey, employed as an elevator mechanic, for insider trading in a scheme to trade ahead of a pharmaceutical company tender offer.  He is the fifth individual charged in connection with the alleged insider trading scheme. The SEC’s...Read More

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed fraud charges against Matthew Groom, a resident of North Carolina and self-employed Managing Director of TechNet UC, a private information technology consulting company that he co-founded, for illegal insider trading in the securities of Spero Therapeutics Inc., a Delaware corporation based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, focused on the...Read More

There are two legal theories of insider trading recognized by the Securities and Exchange Commission: (1) the classical theory, and (2) the misappropriation theory. Under the classical theory, corporate insiders, like officers, directors, and/or employees, violate the federal securities laws by trading in their company’s stock on the basis of material non-public information (MNPI) in...Read More

The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed fraud charges against George Demos, a former Vice President of Drug Safety and Pharmacovigilance at Acadia Pharmaceuticals Inc., for trading on material, non-public information in advance of Acadia’s announcement of negative FDA news regarding its supplemental new drug application.  Acadia had secured prior approval of its drug to...Read More

In its perpetual quest to investigate and prosecute illegal insider trading, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) brought insider trading charges and obtained a final judgment against Barry Siegel, a former Foot Locker employee. The SEC’s insider trading charges, per the SEC’s federal district court complaint, were predicated upon alleged violations of the...Read More

In a rare setback on an appeal, the U.S. Securities and Exchange lost its bid for a significant civil penalty. The underlying SEC insider trading case was tried several years ago and the defendant, Charlie Chen, then appealed.   The SEC’s complaint alleged that Chen, who was close friends with a Vistaprint insider obtained highly material,...Read More

The U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently filed charges against Anthony Marsico, Arthur P. Pizzello. Jr., Robert Quattrocchi, and Timothy Carey for insider trading in the stock of Goodness Growth Holdings, Inc., a cannabis company now doing business as Vireo Growth. The SEC’s complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District...Read More

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) secured a final consent judgment against Andre Wong, a former employee of Lumentum Holdings, Inc., for engaging in illegal insider trading.  While the facts of the underlying insider trading are not unique, the severity of the civil penalty imposed was, no doubt intended to send a strong message...Read More