27/01/2012 Author: Will Wainewright

Ex-Greenlight compliance officer fined

The trader who sold Greenlight Capital’s shareholding in Punch Tavern, an act deemed insider trading by the Financial Services Authority, has been fined by the UK watchdog.

Alexander Ten-Holter, also a former compliance officer at David Einhorn’s $8bn fund manager, was fined £130,000 ($204,000) for “failing to question and make reasonable enquiries” before selling the stock.

Einhorn and Greenlight were yesterday fined £7.2m ($11.3m) for insider trading by the UK regulator after going through with the trade after finding out about a forthcoming equity fundraising round.

The act was labelled a “serious breach” by FSA enforcement chief Tracey McDermott.

Caspar Agnew, a trading desk director at JP Morgan Cazenove, has also been fined £65,000 ($102,000) by the FSA “for failing to identify and act on a suspicious order from Greenlight to sell Punch shares that allowed the firm to be used to facilitate insider dealing or market abuse”.