ASIC's record on insider trading

Sent to jail

Murray Evan Williams, 4 Oct 1996: 18 months periodic detention and fined $50,000 following insider trading charges in relation to the purchase of shares in Australis Media.

Simon Gautier Hannes, 17 Sept 1999: Executive director of Macquarie Bank got 2.1 years for insider trading on $2 million of TNT securities and structuring withdrawals to avoid the reporting requirements under the Financial Transactions Act. In December 2002 the court affirmed the guilty verdict and Hannes received 2.5 years.

Kenneth John Firns, 14 April 2000: 14 months for insider trading in 1995 of mining company Carpenter Pacific Resources NL. Conviction and sentence quashed on 22 May 2001.

Rene Walter Rivkin, 28 May 2003: Nine months of periodic weekend detention and a fine of $30,000. Rivkin was sentenced for insider trading.

Maxwell John Sweetman, 17 Dec 2004: 18 months imprisonment on each charge to be served concurrently for two charges of insider trading in the shares of Harts Australasia. He was a former Executive Director of the company.

Richard James Frawley, 24 July 2005: sentenced to two and a half years of periodic detention on a charge of insider trading in JNA Telecommunications which was taken over by Lucent Technologies in 1998. Frawley worked for one of Lucent's competitors and heard that JNA was on the market. He made a profit of $586,000 but agreed to repay the money, as you can see from this ASIC press release.

Ian Robert Hall
6 charges relating to 850,000 shares
Sentenced to two years and one month in prison, after pleading guilty to one charge of insider trading in late 1998 while a director of Clifford Corporation Ltd (Clifford), then Australia's largest manufacturer of heavy vehicles, such as buses and coaches. Mr Hall was ordered to serve a minimum of one year in prison.

Margot Olive McKay, 30 March 2007: These charges follow a referral to ASIC from Aristocrat and relate to Ms McKay procuring others to trade in the company's shares in August and October 2004 prior to major media announcements to the market. Ms McKay, a media consultant, pleaded guilty and was sentenced in the New South Wales Supreme Court to 15 months periodic detention.

Got Off

Greg Doyle & Alan Evans Mt Kersey

R. Kruse Carpenter Pacific Resources NL
Kruse acquitted at trial

Robert Paul Martin Roehampton Resources NL
6 counts of insider trading during the period 6 – 10 May 1996. Found not guilty by a jury on all charges on 20 February 2004, following a 3 week trial.

Citigroup Global Markets Toll Holdings Ltd
Civil penalty action - ASIC alleged that Citigroup, amongst other allegations engaged in proprietary trading on the basis of inside information. The Federal Court of Australia found that Citigroup did not engage in insider trading or contravene the conflict of interest provisions of the Corporations Act.

Guilty but not jailed

Charles Sweeney Bendigo Mining NL
Undertaking not to manage corporations

R. Cribb
Fined $20,000 for ten counts of insider trading, $142,000 compensation and $50,000 in respect of ASIC's costs. Judge treated the 10 counts as one offence. Judge found he had not acted dishonestly.

Keycorp Ltd Keycorp
EU – repay sum $42,751 and establish & operate a mandatory continuing education program for Keycorp officers

Charters Towers Gold Mines Ltd
Reversal of trades to the value of $70,500 and voluntary undertakings

Malaysia Mining Corporation Ashton Mining Ltd
750,000 Ashton Mining shares frozen – MMC to pay $1,012,683 compensation to ASIC to any sellers of Ashton shares disadvantaged in selling shares to MMC, prior to t/over announcement by De Beers

Michael Macdermott Roehampton Resources NL
8 counts of insider trading relating to sale of Roehampton Resources shares by Mr Macdermott's private companies between 6-10 May 1996; sentenced to 18 months in jail, for each of six counts (to be served concurrently but fully suspended for two years); additionally the court imposed a $20,000 fine on the sixth count. CDPP entered a nolle prosequi in relation to remaining 2 counts on which jury could not reach a verdict

Robert (Bart) Doff Qantas
20,000 shares traded on 2001; found guilty by a jury; was sentenced to 350 hours community service, fined $30,000 and ordered to pay a pecuniary penalty of $37,255.25.

John Petsas and Marc Miot BRL Hardy Ltd
Civil penalty proceedings – ASIC is seeking declarations, pecuniary penalty of $200,000, compensation in favour of the counter parties who suffered losses, and any profits made by defendants resulting from alleged contraventions; consented to declarations that they had contravened the insider trading provisions; Mr Petsas to pay a pecuniary penalty of $75,000, Mr Miot to pay $65,000. The Court also ordered defendants to pay compensation of $128,495.12, being the amount they profited as a result of their contraventions, as well as ASIC's costs, plus ASIC's costs.

Stephen William Vizard Sausage Software Limited, Computershare Limited and Keycorp Limited.
Civil penalty proceedings (breach of director s duties) – alleged that Mr Vizard breached his duty as a director of Telstra Corporation Limited (Telstra) by improperly using information given to him as a director of Telstra to gain an advantage for either himself and/or others. ASIC alleges that between March and July 2000, Mr Vizard used confidential Telstra information when he traded in the shares of three listed public companies, Sausage Software Limited, Computershare Limited and Keycorp Limited. Banned from managing any corporation for 10 years and ordered to pay pecuniary penalties of $390,000.

Troy Ian Reddell Peppercorn Investment Fund (PIV)
Convicted and fined $8,000 in the Brisbane District Court after pleading guilty to one count of insider trading. The court also imposed a pecuniary penalty order of $4,086.80 under the Proceeds of Crime Act. Mr Reddell was charged following ASIC's investigation into the sale of 24,040 shares in the Peppercorn Investment Fund (PIF) held by Mr Reddell's wife on 4 May 2004.

Peter Robert Woodland Kanowna Consolidated Mines
Allegations that he committed five offences of insider trading when he conducted a number of trades between November and December 2003, relating to Kanowna's acquisition of the Cerro Negro gold mine project. Mr Woodland was sentenced on 21 December 2007 in the County Court of Victoria. He was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment, fully suspended, to be of good behaviour for two years, after pleading guilty on Friday 16 November 2007 to one count of insider trading and one count of communicating inside information to other persons.