Former AMD Employee Charged With Insider Trading

AMD confirmed that a former employee was charged in connection with the alleged insider trading scheme.

Mark Anthony Longoria, who worked for AMD from January 2007 to October of this year, faces charges of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit securities fraud, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

"It appears that AMD is the victim of an insider trading scheme," AMD said in an e-mailed statement.

Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, outlined the charges in a statement. “A corrupt network of insiders at some of the world’s leading technology companies served as so-called consultants who sold out their employers by stealing and then peddling their valuable inside information,” Bharara said.

Longoria, while he as employed at AMD, "engaged in consultation calls," during which he "provided confidential AMD information, including inside information," the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

AMD said it is currently cooperating with the authorities in investigation.

"AMD has a clear and comprehensive policy regarding insider trading and a worldwide insider trading training program," the company said. "AMD additionally has policies regarding work by its employees outside of AMD including consulting arrangements such as the so-called expert networks that appear to be at the heart of the government’s insider trading investigations."

In a similar investigation in 2009, several industry executives were charged in an insider trading case involving confidential information about AMD's spin-off of its manufacturing assets in late 2008.

In October 2009, Robert Moffat, senior vice president and group executive at IBM, and five other people were charged in what the FBI at the time called the largest alleged hedge fund insider trading case ever.

Also charged were Rajiv Goel, a director in strategic investments at Intel; Raj Rajaratnam, managing member of Galleon Management; Danielle Chiesi of New Castle Funds; Mark Kurland, an executive at New Castle Funds, and Anil Kumar, a director at McKinsey & Co.

Rajaratnam, Kumar and Goel were charged with making stock transactions based on confidential information shared before the fact about such pending deals as AMD's deal with Abu Dhabi-based investors to spin off the chip maker's silicon fabrication facilities.

Moffat, Chiesi and Kurland were charged with sharing confidential details with Rajaratnam about the deal in August 2008, well ahead of AMD's public announcement of the spin-off on Oct. 7, 2008.

The case, which marked the first time court-authorized wiretaps was used to target insider trading on Wall Street, allegedly netted $20 million in illegal profits, according to the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's office.