Shinrajen Executive Who Sold Shares Before Adverse Disclosure Denies Charges in First Trial

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Yoo Byung-don] Shinilajen’s former executive director Shin Mo (48), who was arrested and indicted on charges of selling stocks in advance after knowing the clinical trial results of the anticancer drug ‘PexaVec’ under development, mostly denied his charges at the first trial.

On the 3rd, at the Seoul Southern District Court Criminal Division 12 (Presiding Judge Oh Sang-yong), the prosecution argued that Shin, having prior knowledge of the unfavorable futility evaluation results of PexaVec’s phase 3 clinical trial targeting liver cancer, sold all 167,777 shares he held from June 27 to July 3 last year for about 8.8 billion KRW, thereby avoiding losses worth approximately 6.4 billion KRW (violation of the Capital Markets Act).

On the other hand, Shin’s defense attorney explained, “The defendant did not know any undisclosed information and sold the stocks for personal reasons such as tax payments or preparing a deposit for a jeonse lease. As the executive in charge of strategic planning, he was responsible for budgeting and other tasks unrelated to research and development, so he did not have access to undisclosed information.”

He added, “The prosecution has not specifically identified when, how, or what information the defendant obtained, so there is a dispute.”

During the trial, the prosecution and defense discussed evidence admission and trial schedules. The next trial is scheduled for the 24th.

Shinilajen announced on August 2 last year that it had been advised by the Independent Data Monitoring Committee (DMC) in the U.S. to halt the PexaVec clinical trial. Following this announcement, Shinilajen’s stock price fell to the lower limit for three consecutive trading days. The stock price, which was in the 40,000 KRW range, dropped to the low 10,000 KRW range within a month.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.