Daily Lessons from Life 05 February 2011 - UK Insider Trader Goes to Jail!!

"Sat, Feb 05, 2011 AsiaOne - Briton amassed $1.2 million profit with S'porean wife from insider trading

Greed was the clear motivation for the most serious case of insider trading to appear before a British court.

After all, Christian Littlewood, an investment banker who made his way up the ranks to director at Dresdner Kleinwort, had already been earning £400,000 (S$820,000) a year. And yet he still used information gleaned from the office to make £590,000 in profit from illegal insider trading.

He made his Singaporean wife Angie, 39, to use her maiden name, Lew Siew Yoon, to buy the shares in her name to avoid detection. She teamed up with her Singaporean friend, Helmy Omar Sa'aid, in using her husband's price-sensitive tip-offs to trade 2.15 million pounds worth of shares."

This case again made it very clear that greed knows no boundaries, national nor race nor religions! People using privileged information to profit knowing that it is illegal and that if they were caught, which until recently had been a rarity, their hard earned reputation will go to the dogs, still wanted to tempt fate.

Lessons for me are:

1. unless you are 'clear' about why you should not be wanting that extra money, you will try your luck.That 'why' is a deliberate and rational decision. It is NOT something emotional. Once that decision is made, you will focus on blocking out and killing any slightest mention of 'let's try our luck to get that extra money'! If you don't immediately clear that thought out of your mind, repeatedly and each and every time it was mentioned to you, you WILL fall prey to the temptation. Like some religious quotes that said: the flesh is willing but the mind is weak!;

2. when you are in a position of influence and authority, you will bring others into ruin as well as you coerced or 'influence' them to carry out your intention and instruction. It is a bigger responsibility when you are in position of influence and authority to doubly or triply strong in eliminating such thought! If you are caught you should expect to be punished twice over and without mercy!;

3. it will be interesting to learn what does the culprit do with the extra money. Did he buy another bottle of fine wine or a fancy new car or whatever instead of using the money to help the poor and one of his kids that supposedly has a serious medical challenge. If he did the latter, I can still emphatize with his action. If not, it is regretful and he has to pay heavily for this indiscretion. As to his wife who was judged to be 'the unwilling partner in this crime' and suffering from mild depression, empathy and sympathy are warranted. Hopefully, she gets off lightly and to continue to be a good mother to the 3 kids.

May more such cases be uncovered and the culprits brought to justice and punished severely and mercilessly. We CANNOT allow such smart and high powered people to get away with such crimes and make a mockery of hones working people!