AMF France v. A (newsletter-scalping, 2010)

Judgment entered

✓ Checked against the primary document on October 5, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, in a single reading of the French decision; an independent second reading of 60 of the AMF records agreed on every field for 54 and on the core fields for 59. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.

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In December 2010 the AMF's Commission des sanctions fined an investment-newsletter publisher 500,000 euros for recommending a small listed car-parts company in April 2009 after buying its shares, without disclosing the conflict, and ordered the decision published at his expense in newsletters, the press and a telephone service.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

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Disgorgement

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Prejudgment interest

—

Total relief

—

Alleged gain

—

Penalty as published

€500k

A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars. This regulator states penalties in EUR. The figure is recorded as published and is not converted, so it does not appear in the USD totals or medians used elsewhere on this site.

What is alleged to have happened

The Commission des sanctions of the Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF, France) heard the case on 16 December 2010 and decided the same day. M. A, who controlled a financial-publishing group, did not file written observations or ask to be heard by the rapporteur. The charge was notified in December 2009.

The notification alleged that A bought shares in a listed company (Y), then published positive opinions and a buy recommendation on several media he controlled, and then sold almost all the shares, without disclosing the conflict of interest. The shares traded between about 0.85 and 1.18 euros until 1 April 2009, then rose to 4.25 euros on 8 April and a high of 5.48 euros on 9 April on heavy volume.

The Commission found that A had bought through a company he controlled, ending up with 1.36 per cent of the issuer's capital between 24 March and 2 April 2009. It found that he then gave price targets of 5 to 12 euros in comments and published a buy recommendation in a newsletter on 7 April 2009, and that his sales from 8 April produced a gain of 133,338 euros. Mentioning the portfolio at a shareholders' meeting did not, it held, amount to appropriate and effective disclosure.

It found the charge made out, imposed a financial penalty of 500,000 euros and ordered publication of parts of the decision at A's expense in his own newsletter and weekly, two other publications, and on his audiotel service for three trading days.

This record does not show whether other readers lost money, whether the price rise was caused by the recommendations, or whether the decision was appealed. The issuer and the publications are anonymised in the published text.

This library tags the matter as newsletter-scalping. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's. For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary document linked above. This page deliberately summarises the structured record rather than reproducing the decision.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Newsletter scalping — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2010-12-16 Commission des sanctions decision

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• AMF decision page
• Decision (PDF, French)

The linked release is published by the issuing regulator under its own terms. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added October 5, 2026. submit a correction.