Frank Perkins Hixon Jr, a former investment banker at Evercore Group, was charged with insider trading by US authorities on Friday, February 21, Reuters reported.
Court records showed that the 55-year old Hixon who once worked as a senior manager at Evercore was accused of utilizing inside information to conduct trades in Evercore stocks as well as in Westway Group and Titanium Metals. In the two companies, the accounts were held by his former girlfriend and his father, the report said.
In a parallel lawsuit, the US Securities and Exchange Commission said the two accounts were that of Hixon's ex-girlfriend Destiny Wind Robinson and his 80-year old father Frank Hixon Sr. According to the criminal complaint, Hixon pocketed profits of $600,000 while the civil case from the SEC placed Hixon's profits at $950,000, the report said.
In a statement, FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge George Venizelos said, "This is the same old song: Another high-ranking finance official allegedly broke the law and abused his position in a thinly veiled attempt to make illegal trades."
Hixon was apprehended on Friday morning in his New York apartment and now faces five counts of securities fraud, two counts of securities fraud related to a tender offer and a single count of issuing a false statement. A $5 million bail was set by a federal magistrate in a New York hearing. The SEC, on the other hand, got an order from a Texas judge which froze $1.2 million in the account of Robinson, the report said.
Evercore spokesman George Sard said in a statement that the firm had told regulators about its concerns and that they conducted an internal probe into the matter that finally culminated in the firing of Hixon in January. Sard called Hixon a "rogue employee" and added, "We have never had a situation like this before in Evercore's nearly 20-year history."
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