American multinational financial firm Wells Fargo has been ordered to pay a fine of $5 million by the Securities and Exchange Commission after investigations revealed that the company had attempted to cover up repeated trading malpractices by a broker at one of its outposts.
The regulators have charged the firm with failing to enforce financial laws that prevent insider trading and also covering the tracks of the accused broker for about six months.
The broker in question, Waldyr Da Silva Prado Neto, who has since been dismissed by Wells Fargo, is reported to have tipped off his investors in Brazil about the sale of Burger King in 2010. He is reported to have subsequently made about $175,000 from trading the stock.
Wells Fargo, Prado and one of his clients - Igor Cornelson, who made more than $1.6 million from the illegal transaction - have been on trial since the beginning of the year. In January, a court in New York ordered the guilty broker to pay a fine of about $5.6 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission.
It is unclear why Wells Fargo officials initially refused to comply with the Securities and Exchange Commission's investigation into the activities of Prado by withholding documents relating to the Burger King transaction. However, reports indicate that the company, which later furnished the information to the authorities on its own accord, has pleaded guilty to trading malpractices.
According to the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission's enforcement division, Daniel M. Hawke, the actions of the company improperly delayed investigations into the alleged trading malpractices and interfered with the search for truth.
Wells Fargo has been involved in a number of insider trading scandals over the past few years. In 2013, an investment banker at the firm pleaded guilty to insider trading and money laundering after he was charged of trading malpractices which generated up to $11 million.
