SYDNEY, June 24 (Xinhua) -- A high flying Australian banker has been jailed for at least one year for insider trading that netted him 1.43 million Australian dollars (1.04 million U.S. dollars).
Husband of high-profile Australian publicist Roxy Jacenko, 30-year-old Oliver Curtis was convicted of making illicit trades based on confidential information provided by his high-school friend, a former Orion Assets employee, John Hartman for 13 months between May 2007 and June 2008.
Hartman, who executed trades on behalf of Orion, sent Curtis messages directing him to buy or sell particular stocks for a particular number of Contracts For Difference (CFDs) at specific times.
The sentence was welcomed by Australia's securities regulator as a reinforcement of its efforts to pursue complex trading cases no matter how long they take.
"My message to the market as always is that ASIC will continue to take strong enforcement action against those that conduct insider trading to make sure that our markets are fair, orderly and transparent," Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) chairman Greg Medcraft told reporters in Sydney on Friday after the sentence was handed down.
In handing down her sentence at the New South Wales Supreme Court on Friday, Justice Lucy McCallum said accepting the defence's offer to forfeit 1.43 million Australian dollars from the sale of a home as reparation was "cynical" in the absence of him taking responsibility for his actions.
Sending Curtis to prison for a maximum of two years -- to be released after one - was a strong deterrent to possible offenders of white-collar crime, McCallum said.
Curtis used the proceeds of their insider trading to "fund a lifestyle of conspicuous extravagance," McCallum said in her judgement, through a new car, motorbike and a cash payment to Hartman, vacations with friends the United States, and a luxury apartment.
