International Law

Mark Cuban's Defence

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

From the Bloomberg news on Mark Cuban

"Billionaire Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks basketball team, was sued by U.S. regulators over claims he made illegal insider trades four years ago in shares of Internet search company Mamma.com Inc.

Cuban, 50, became ``very upset and angry'' in 2004 after the company told him in confidence it planned to sell stock below its trading price, the Securities and Exchange Commission said in a civil suit today at federal court in Dallas. Within four hours, he sold his 6.3 percent stake, avoiding more than $750,000 in losses after Mamma.com's sale was announced, the SEC said.

``It is fundamentally unfair for someone to use access to nonpublic information to improperly gain an edge on the market,'' Scott Friestad, the SEC enforcement official overseeing the case, said in a statement."

So, Mark Cuban was charged with insider trading, apparently because he unwittingly received confidential information and then traded on it.

Cuban is not a insider, nor did he accept a fiduciary relationship.

They say that behind every legal defence is great story.

So here is Cuban's defence.

Full post as published by Misleading Advertising Law on November 20, 2008 (boomark / email).