ASIC secures guilty pleas in Telegram ‘pump and dump’ action (2025)

Judgment entered

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In June 2025 ASIC announced that Larissa Quinlan, Kurt Stuart, Emma Summer and Syed Yusuf had pleaded guilty in the Downing Centre Local Court to conspiracy to commit market rigging and to dealing with proceeds of crime, arising from a Telegram group that promoted penny stocks to public channels in August and September 2021. Sentencing was still to come.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

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Disgorgement

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Prejudgment interest

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Total relief

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Alleged gain

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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.

What is alleged to have happened

the Australian Securities and Investments Commission announced this matter on June 10, 2025 as release 25-098MR. The respondents named are Larissa Quinlan, Kurt Stuart, Emma Summer and Syed Yusuf (4 individuals, 0 entities).

The four pleaded guilty to the conspiracy, which the release dates from about 28 August to 22 September 2021 (from 17 September for Yusuf), and to proceeds-of-crime counts. ASIC describes a private Telegram group that selected penny stocks to promote to public groups named the ASX Pump and Dump Group and Channel. The maximum penalty for the conspiracy offence is 15 years. This library tags the matter as chat group pumps and pump and dump.

The conduct is recorded against equities.

The release references a parallel criminal proceeding. Where a criminal case exists, the civil and criminal outcomes are recorded separately, because they resolve on different standards of proof.

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 release.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with 2 techniques 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.

• Chat group pumps — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.
• Pump and dump — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2025-06-10 ASIC media release

Primary documents

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

• ASIC media release

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

Same matter

The library links these 3 records because they appear to concern one matter: the same lead defendant, an overlapping technique tag and close filing dates, or a shared court docket or a release that cites the other. Records are listed by date filed.

This grouping is the library's, made by matching names, techniques, dates and citations when the site is built. It is not the regulator's or a court's determination that the records are one case, and it errs towards missing a link rather than making a false one.

Related actions

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

Record added September 10, 2026. submit a correction.