Gold Price Manipulation: US Securities Firm Employee Faces Trial

Raised prices through false trades then sold for profit
Price manipulation from 2008 to 2014... Boasted to others immediately after manipulation

[Asia Economy Reporter Minwoo Lee] Two former securities traders have been brought to trial in the United States on charges of manipulating the prices of futures products such as gold.

According to major foreign media including Bloomberg on the 22nd, Edward Base and another trader who worked at Deutsche Bank are currently on trial at the U.S. Northern District Court of Illinois for these price manipulation charges.

It is reported that they raised prices by placing large buy orders on one side while selling on the other to secure profits. On January 28, 2009, Base placed buy orders for 2,740 gold futures contracts worth approximately $244 million (about 280.5 billion KRW) over about 4 minutes and 30 seconds to induce a price increase. A co-conspiring trader then sold 170 gold futures contracts worth about $15 million to secure profits. Most of the buy orders Base placed to raise the price were canceled before the trades were executed.

Notably, it was also uncovered that immediately after these price manipulation trades, Base boasted to his colleague Cedric Channu that manipulating the market was easy and that he had fooled the market. The price manipulation activities by Base and others are understood to have continued from 2008 to 2014.

Meanwhile, their criminal charges were discovered by the trading analysis firm Analysis Group, which was commissioned by the Chicago prosecutor's office. Maria Garibotti, Vice President of Analysis Group, testified about this in court on the 21st (local time).

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