9 ms·

I'm not sure if this is standard for SEC press releases, but why do they include details such as, "he was a school teacher" and, "he owed gambling debts"? I've

• VWWHFSfQ 5y ago
  > designed to go after the smallest possible players SEC doesn't have infinite resources to go after every possible financial crime. They go after the ones that have the highest likelihood of successful prosecution. This is the case with most prosecutions like this.
  • spaceribs 5y ago
    > SEC doesn't have infinite resources to go after every possible financial crime. So that makes token gestures acceptable?
  • throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    That's called "revenue policing" and the only people who like it are the people high status enough to not be subject to it.
    • notsureaboutpg 5y ago
      Whatever it's called doesn't matter. There's not a viable alternative. If you don't prosecute charges with substantial evidence, the risk of loss increases and eventually the department bleeds money at too large a degree and gets shut down causing no enforcement
    • JumpCrisscross 5y ago
      > the only people who like it are the people high status enough to not be subject to it Everyone at the SEC is keenly aware that bagging a high-ranking financier is a ticket to higher office.
      • slickrick216 5y ago
        Which is quite frankly disgusting even if society does have a somewhat merited hatred of bankers.
      • jessaustin 5y ago
        Can we come up with an example of an SEC official building upon an investigation of a "high-ranking financier" in order to obtain high office?
        • verbify 5y ago
          Not SEC, but US attorney for the Southern District Preet Bharara apparently made his fame by going after Wall Street bigwigs. I don't know much about him besides his Wikipedia page (which could be edited by a PR firm), but it seems that was his career trajectory.
          • shard 5y ago
            Another not-SEC example would be Eliot Spitzer who parlayed his policing of Wall Street corruption as the Attorney General of New York into a governorship.
        • byset 5y ago
          SEC pursued junk bond pioneer Michael Milken in the 1980s, Ivan Boesky before that… unsure of specifics of SEC personnel getting to “high office” because of that but seems obvious that high profile successful prosecutions would be career-making (Granted those examples are from the 80s but i would think there are more recent examples…) Milken was prosecuted by Rudy Giuliani which didn’t hurt Giuliani’s career, but Rudy was a US district attorney or something, not SEC Agree with your sentiment generally though, seems like a boatload of people could have been put away after the financial crisis but they instead profited from bailouts
    • stale2002 5y ago
      Do you have an alternative solution, to getting around the problem of the fact that they don't have infinite resources? Do you think that they should just go after crimes, at random, even if that means that much less crimes are successfully caught, because of the inefficient use of resources?
• realist2001 5y ago
  >> why do they include details such as, "he was a school teacher" and, "he owed gambling debts"? They want to signal to larger players (hedge funds, etc) that enforcement is only on smaller players like high school teachers. They are signaling to their rich friends and power brokers in NYC/Connecticut that there is nothing to worry about w/r/t to the real, bigtime insider trading. This comment is meant to be both sarcastic and true, however depressing.
  • Simulacra 5y ago
    Mayhaps to make the story more salacious?
  • elliekelly 5y ago
    > They want to signal to larger players (hedge funds, etc) that enforcement is only on smaller players like high school teachers. Galleon Group and SAC Capital would disagree. I believe there's also a pretty senior (now former) Apple attorney who's recently been charged.
  • clipradiowallet 5y ago
    justice.gov and sec.gov are not just-the-facts style sites. They are meant to inform the public as well as vilify wrong-doers. Part of making sure their stories are picked up widely, is including those types of details to make the story more "interesting" to the masses.
• jonas21 5y ago
  The full context in the press release is: > The SEC’s complaint alleges that Wylam, a high school teacher and bookmaker, traded on this information and also tipped Naveen Sood, who owed Wylam a six-figure gambling debt. Sood allegedly traded on this information and tipped his three friends Marcus Bannon, Matthew Rauch, and Naresh Ramaiya, each of whom also illegally traded on the information. In order to make an insider trading case against people who are several degrees out, they have to show how non-public information flowed to them. Establishing that Wylam is a bookmaker and Sood is a client of his is an important part of this. Maybe the "high school teacher" part isn't particularly relevant, but if you cut it, it would sound like he was a full-time bookmaker, which isn't the case.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• slickrick216 5y ago
  Yes
• granshaw 5y ago
  I also found the "best friend" part to be strange – I expected language more like "close acquaintance" instead
  • Wistar 5y ago
    BFF.
    • hilbertseries 5y ago
      bestie
  • byset 5y ago
    Wouldn’t that just leave you with more syllables and less precise language?
• rasz 5y ago
  Would you prefer "he wasnt sufficiently politically connected" and "his family never made friends in the right circles"
• rhizome 5y ago
  >why do they include details such as, "he was a school teacher" and, "he owed gambling debts"? I would assume to soften the expectations that result in this kind of no-guilt thing you never see given to...other segments of society: Bannon, Rauch, and Ramaiya consented to the entry of final judgments without admitting or denying the allegations in the complaint