Posted on 05/15/2009 7:19:18 PM PDT by coloradan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement lawyers are under investigation by federal criminal authorities for allegedly using insider information to trade stocks, a report by the SEC's internal watchdog said.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Attorney's Office are conducting an investigation of possible criminal and civil violations, the SEC's inspector general David Kotz said in a March 3 letter to SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro. (snip)
The report redacts the names of the enforcement lawyers. Both the report and letter were made available on Friday. (snip)
But the two lawyers did trade in the financial services company and denied they heard about the investigations, the report alleges. (snip)
It is not clear whether this violates SEC rules.
One lawyer sent e-mails to his brother and sister-in-law from his SEC e-mail account during the work day recommending particular stocks and sometimes informing his relatives that the other lawyer had also recommended them, the report alleges.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
2. If SEC people traded stocks in certain companies and lied about their knowledge of investigations into those same companies, and the SEC doesn't even know whether it violates the law, the law is no good. (And the SEC no good either.)
Wasn’t this Martha Stewart’s crime???
This is a lot worse than Martha’s crime, in my opinion.
What a joke. They should only be able to own mutual funds. Trade stocks? Insanity!
Well...IMHO...M Stewart should NEVER have gone to prison...that was ridiculous....a huge fine and community service would have been best. And, yes, I know she’s a flaming liberal...but, still...
BUMBA** lawyer about to be hung out to dry.
I beg to differ. The brokerage industry protects its own much of the time. All sorts of improprieties are tolerated ... with occasional enforcement to make the investing public think that meaningful regulation exists.
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