Justice Department accuses lawyers of insider trading ring
BigLaw lawyers provided tips on scores of mergers as part of an insider trading ring involving tens of millions of dollars in illegal profits, according to a May 6 press release from the U.S. Department of Justice. (Image from Shutterstock)
BigLaw lawyers provided tips on scores of mergers as part of an insider trading ring involving tens of millions of dollars in illegal profits, according to a May 6 press release from the U.S. Department of Justice.
Charges against 30 defendants were announced Wednesday by prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office for the District of Massachusetts. The defendants are alleged to have stolen and used confidential information on nearly 30 merger and acquisition deals shepherded by law firms, including Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz; Latham & Watkins; and Goodwin Procter.
Two indictments, as well as a parallel lawsuit filed by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, focus on Nicolo Nourafchan, a 2011 Yale Law School graduate who worked at three large firms, including Goodwin and Latham, between 2013 and 2023.
Nourafchan is accused of misappropriating confidential deal information and conspiring with a college classmate, Robert Yadgarov, to recruit other corporate lawyers to provide tips.
Prosecutors say the deals involved included “some of the largest M&A deals of the past decade,” according to Law360, including Occidental Petroleum’s $55 billion acquisition of the Anadarko Petroleum Corp. in 2019 and Johnson & Johnson’s $31 billion acquisition of Swiss rare drug manufacturer Actelion Ltd. in 2017.
Bloomberg Law and Law360 had stories on the indictments.
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