Senate’s Grassley Says SAC Capital Met With Investigation Staff
SAC Capital Advisors LP officials have met with investigators from Senator Charles Grassley’s staff in his examination of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s oversight of the hedge-fund firm’s trading practices.
“My staff basically just listened,” Grassley, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, said in an interview with Bloomberg Television today. The lawmaker said his central focus is on the regulator, not the firm. “What we’re trying to do is get information from the SEC on whether or not the SEC is doing its job.”
In a letter this week, Grassley asked SEC chairman Mary Schapiro to explain how the regulator has handled allegations of suspicious trading at SAC Capital, referring to about 20 examples he received from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority of possible insider trading involving the firm founded by billionaire Steven A. Cohen.
The Iowa senator had asked Finra last month to provide information on the “potential scope of suspicious trading activity” at the firm.
“If we get the information from the SEC, we’re going to look into all 20 of those trades,” said Grassley, who added he would look for evidence of “hanky-panky.”
SAC Capital, which has about $13 billion under management, has come under scrutiny, with U.S. prosecutors investigating accounts at the Stamford, Connecticut-based hedge fund tied to Noah Freeman and Donald Longueuil, former portfolio managers who pleaded guilty to federal insider-trading allegations.
“I don’t have any control over private enterprises,” Grassley said. “I want to make sure the SEC is doing its job of due diligence.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Jesse Hamilton in Washington at jhamilton33@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Lawrence Roberts at lroberts13@bloomberg.net.
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