Court accepts Sun co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim's insider trading settlement

A California federal court has entered a final judgment in the US Securities and Exchange Commission's insider trading case against billionaire Andreas "Andy" Bechtolsheim, co-founder of Sun Microsystems and founder of Arista Networks. The SEC alleged in a complaint [PDF] filed on March 26, 2024 that in 2019 Bechtolsheim …

[lglethal]

You have a net worth of $18 BILLION. You see an illegal opportunity to increase that by, well lets assume he thought he would make $1 million from the transaction, that it only made half that is irrelevant. That's an increase in your net worth of 0.0055%. In other words a rounding error...

How F%&king GREEDY must you be to think that's a good idea????

[Missing Semicolon]

Maybe it was a tip to a relative or friend.

[Anonymous Coward]

You inadvertently point out on why the SEC's allegation doesn't make sense. Would a billionaire risk reputational damage and criminal charges to make $415,000? Unlikely.

But might less wealthy people around a billionaire hear something and try to profit off it? More likely. And then when the SEC busts the small fish, then figures out where the info originally came from, SEC wants to go after the big fish. And the big fish might agree to pay a trivial amount (for a billionaire) to make it go away. Does that make more sense?

[excperr]

Look at him...

Why would you trust anything he says?

[Anonymous Coward]

(In)significant digits

For a 68-year-old in the United States with an average net worth of $1,675,214, the proportionally equivalent fine would be $84.

What would the fine be for someone with a below average net worth of $1,675,213.99?

[Mike 137]

Re: (In)significant digits

"What would the fine be for someone with a below average net worth of $1,675,213.99?"

Probably a hell of a lot more. The richer you are, the greater the impunity you exercise.

"The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread"¹ but it penalises the poorest hardest for doing so.

_{1: Anatole France}

.

[Professur]

Terminology

Remember folks ... criminal with a fine means legal for a price.