A man from California has been sentenced to two years in prison for his involvement in an insider trading scheme that earned him over $650,000 in illegal profits. The person convicted is Shahriyar Bolandian, a 36-year-old from Brentwood, Los Angeles. He was found guilty of using secret information about two major corporate acquisitions to trade stocks before the public knew about them.
Bolandian’s illegal activities took place between 2012 and 2013. The information that he used was given to him by his childhood friend, who was working as an investment banking analyst at J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, one of the biggest financial firms in the world. This secret information involved two upcoming business deals.
The first one was a planned acquisition in April 2012, where Integrated Device Technology Inc. (IDT) was going to buy PLX Technology Inc. The second was a deal in June 2013, when Salesforce.com Inc. was set to acquire ExactTarget Inc. These announcements were going to affect the stock prices of both companies, but because Bolandian knew about them ahead of time, he made a lot of money by trading stocks in advance of the public knowledge.
Illegal Trading Brought Big Profits
Bolandian made more than $340,000 in profits from his illegal stock trades. He used this money to pay off personal loans and cover previous trading losses. While this may sound like a lot of money, the real problem was that Bolandian was breaking the law. Using insider information to make money in the stock market is illegal because it gives people an unfair advantage. It is considered cheating because most other investors don’t have access to the same kind of information.
To explain in simpler terms, imagine someone telling you which numbers are going to come up in a lottery draw before it happens. If you buy the winning lottery ticket before the draw and win, it wouldn’t be fair, right? This is what Bolandian did, except instead of lottery tickets, he was making trades in the stock market using information that only a few people knew about at the time. His actions were considered insider trading, which is a serious crime.
Massive Insider Trading Case: A Breakthrough in Financial Justice
A Legal Battle and the Court’s Decision
After a long investigation and trial, Bolandian was found guilty in April 2024. A jury convicted him of six counts of insider trading. The case was investigated by the FBI, which is responsible for investigating crimes like this, and the prosecutors were from both the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. Trial Attorney Della Sentilles and other prosecutors worked hard to bring this case to court.
It was revealed during the trial that Bolandian’s friend, who worked at J.P. Morgan, gave him the secret information about the corporate acquisitions. This was the information that Bolandian used to make his trades. Because he knew the deals were coming, he could buy or sell stocks in the companies involved, making money before anyone else had a chance to react to the news.
Consequences of Breaking the Law
At the sentencing, the judge ordered that Bolandian serve two years in federal prison for his actions. This decision highlights how seriously the government takes insider trading. People who break the law in this way face heavy consequences, including jail time. In addition to prison, Bolandian may also face other legal penalties as part of his conviction.
The government has emphasized that insider trading is a crime that harms the fairness of the stock market. When some people have access to secret information, it gives them an unfair advantage over those who play by the rules. That’s why laws against insider trading are strict, and people who violate them are held accountable.
This case serves as a reminder to anyone involved in the financial world: using secret information to make money is illegal, and those who do so can face serious consequences. It also shows that the government and law enforcement agencies are watching closely for signs of wrongdoing, especially in the financial markets.
