Two arrested after German and UK insider trading probe
Two people have been arrested in London on suspicion of insider trading after investigators raided two addresses in the UK and one in Germany, the City watchdog said yesterday.
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) said that a 37-year-old professional man and a 28-year-old woman had been arrested after the joint operation with the police and prosecuting authority in the central German state of Hesse. “No further details can be confirmed at this time,” the FSA said in a brief statement. “The arrests are not linked to any other ongoing insider dealing investigation.”
The Frankfurt prosecutor’s office declined to comment.
The man, who was authorised by the FSA, is likely to have been working in the financial services sector and have been aware of the relevant laws and regulations governing insider dealing, one source familiar with the arrests said. The raids, in the early hours of Tuesday, were carried out in London and in Koenigstein, near the German city of Frankfurt.
The FSA, which lost an insider dealing case in June, is keen to keep up the pressure on market abuse as it prepares to fight high-profile cases in court next year as part of a quest to clean up London and prove its mettle as a prosecutor.
The regulator has secured six prison sentences for insider dealing to date, although two were suspended and former Cazenove partner Malcolm Calvert – one of its highest-profile scalps – was released after serving just seven months in jail.
Seven other suspects have yet to be charged. They include senior executives at DeutscheBank and Exane.