Chinese fund manager to be sacked for insider trading

The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) said a fund manager at a Shanghai-based joint venture fund management firm has been guilty of insider trading, Caijing Magazine reported Wednesday.

Tang Jian, a fund manager at China International Fund Management Co., in which JPMorgan Asset Management (UK) Limited holds 49 percent stake, made illegal profits of 1.5 million yuan using insider information, the magazine reported on its website.

In a classic case of insider trading, it said Tang bought more than 260,000 shares in Xinjiang Jionworld Co. through the accounts of his father and a third person before his fund started to buy the shares.

Shares in the aluminum producer in the northwestern Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region was a favorite of fund investors last year.

Three China International Fund Management Co. funds bought shares in Xinjiang Jionworld. Its shares surged to 27.50 yuan on Tuesday from around 17 yuan in late September last year.

The leading business magazine said Tang will be sacked following the the investigation. Fund managers are barred from insider trading of stocks for themselves and relatives.

The crackdown on illegal trading comes as the nation's securities regulator tries to cool the red-hot equity market, the magazine said.

The CSRC has again warned investors about the risks of the stock market and vowed to crackdown on insider trading and "rat trading" by fund management companies.

"Rat trading" occurs when a broker receives an order from a client to buy a share at a certain price. If the broker believes the share will drop, he may be tempted to wait and buy the stock at a lower price through his own account. He then sells the stock to the client at the client's original price and pockets the difference.

Source: Xinhua