Trio charged by the SEC for $1m insider trading

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has charged a former financial consultant, his father, and two close friends with $1 m in insider trading.

Federico Nannin made the decisions alongside his friends and family ahead of MasTec Inc.’s pending acquisition of Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (IEA). Nannin was a consultant working with a financial firm, IEA was a client of this firm, and where he got the information to feed back to his accomplices, said the SEC.

Former consultant and close friends and family charged

Federico Nannini was entrusted with sensitive information known as “material nonpublic information” that MasTec had the intention to buy IEA. He then funneled this information to the close friends and family.

According to the SEC report, he instructed his father to purchase “34,500 shares of IEA over the next several weeks for $310,729. The SEC’s investigation also found that, on June 15, Federico Nannini tipped his close friend Alejandro Thermiotis about the planned acquisition, which prompted Thermiotis to purchase more than $1.6 million of IEA stock before the market closed on June 16. Thermiotis then tipped his and Federico Nannini’s high school friend, Francisco Tonarely, about the acquisition, which led Tonarely to purchase 321 shares of IEA on June 16.”

The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida charged Nannini, Mauro Nannini, Thermiotis, and Tonarely with “violating the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws and seeks injunctive relief and civil penalties against all defendants and disgorgement with prejudgment interest against Mauro Nannini, Thermiotis, and Tonarely.”

“The first rule of material nonpublic information is: You don’t talk about material nonpublic information,” said Eric I. Bustillo, Director of the SEC’s Miami Regional Office. “As alleged in our complaint, Federico Nannini broke the rule and federal law when he shared information about MasTec’s probable acquisition of IEA with his dad and high school buddy. This case underscores our steadfast commitment to expose insider trading and to hold violators, including financial professionals, accountable for their actions.”

In a parallel action, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida announced criminal charges against all involved.

Image: Pixlr.

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