There's a lot of companies out there. It's easy to pick one that definitely won't get you in to trouble instead of one that probably won't get you in to trouble.
Most Senior Execs and the whole Financial division typically fall under these umbrellas.
not familiar with the whole situation, but I'd worry the company would tell me times that were advantageous for it, not necessarily for me.
on edit: I suppose the downvotes are HNs way of telling me that would be a silly thing to worry about. Thanks for the clarification.
on second edit: thanks for the actual clarifications as to why I would be silly to worry about that kind of thing.
Besides, are there really bad and good times for the company? Its not like the company itself is affected, just the stock holders. Management wants stock to go up because management usually owns stock. So screwing you would also screw themselves.
Last of all, if you dont like the blackout periods, you can just setup an arms length plan to bypass it https://www.investopedia.com/terms/r/rule-10b5-1.asp
My company does this and it is a relief for legal compliance reasons.
>As further explained in Amazon’s Insider Trading FAQs, “puts, calls, warrants and other types of option securities” were required to “be cleared in advance with the Legal Department, regardless of whether that employee is otherwise subject to preclearance or to the trading window, even if that employee is not in possession of material nonpublic information.”
Amazon employees require Amazon's Legal approval before trading Amazon options.
page 6, #17-21
These are not stock. You definitely don’t need Amazon Legal approval to trade Amazon stock - otherwise all employees that get RSUs would need approval to sell their stock.
> Amazon employees require Amazon's Legal approval before trading Amazon stock.
Options are not stock, they're options. Employees are generally (maybe always?) restricted from trading in derivatives like options. That doesn't mean they can't trade stock (outside blackout windows).
Err, example please? I'm totally blanking here, not gonna lie.
This is not common. In the story, the guy's wife worked in finance so had confidential info about earnings. The rank and file can trade whenever the hell we want with whatever stock we want, including our employer's. No one bats an eye.
In almost every case, no employees (insider or otherwise) are permitted to sell derivatives (calls, puts), while they are employed.
There should instead be restrictions on the time for an order to go through, not on the act of insider trading.
What stops from former workers at intelligence agencies from starting a hedge fund and employing all methods they learned while at work, to acquire such valuable information, trade based on that and offer others money management services?
That wouldn't be insider trading. Indeed hedge funds are known to use intelligence data like satellite photos etc.
If they use illegal monitoring devices, hacking for info etc, they may fall afoul of federal espionage, wiretapping or CFFA, but it would still not be insider trading.
that would still be trading on material non public information which is prohibited.
Note also that there are difference between US and EU. I think US might require a breach of duty of care somwhere in the chain of responsibilities for insider trading, while EU doesn't.
Thats an interesting point, if I hack the CEO’s phone and get the earnings number a day ahead, then trade off them, I kind of wonder how that isnt insider information.
Although laws around that are so odd, especially in US, that it wouldn’t surprise me.
(not a lawyer, not legal advice)
There isn’t an inherent legal issue here
Insider trading also requires you or the person you got information from to have a fiduciary or contractual duty not to share information
That typically ends after employment or when the NDA expires
There is nothing illegal about having an advantage in the market, if thats the assumption where you are starting from
An alternative would be to have criminal parents serve time consecutively -- that way noone gets away, and the children would not have to be taken away.
> As part of the plea agreement, Bohra’s wife will not face criminal charges. Bohra’s wife is no longer employed at Amazon.
The wife (and family) lost 2.6 million, plus her job, and the husband - so it's not like she got away with something, just avoided the worst of the punishment.
They had to pay back their gains, pay additional fees, and one of them serves jail time. They did not get away with anything.
"Giving someone the data" is probably a different violation to "trading with illegally obtained data".
She probably got a different penalty (breaking NDA or similar) then he did.
It sounds to me like even giving information to someone if you know that person will trade is illegal.
https://www.investor.gov/introduction-investing/investing-ba...
Basically they were able to cough up the $2mm the SEC wanted in the parallel civil suit, and didnt attempt to challenge the criminal case, so the prosecutors in the criminal case chose not to
Women generally get less time for the same crime.
>Bohra engaged in illegal insider trading in advance of 11 straight earnings announcements.”
>He and his family members have paid $2,652,899 in disgorgement, interest and penalties.
And 26 months in prison! This is why if you're going to do any kind of trading yourself -- never touch the company you work for.
Some more info on the original SEC filing as well: https://www.sec.gov/litigation/complaints/2020/comp24923.pdf