ASIC v. Don Evans (insider trading, 2020)

Judgment entered

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In September 2020 ASIC reported that Don Evans and Avrohom Kimelman were charged over a plan to manipulate Quantum Resources' share price on 16 November 2015. Evans pleaded guilty to conspiring to manipulate the price and on 31 January 2023 was sentenced in the Supreme Court of Western Australia to 12 months' imprisonment, released immediately on a A$5,000 recognisance. ASIC's later release does not mention the insider trading counts originally listed against him.

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 September 28, 2020 as release 20-223MR. The respondents named are Don Evans (1 individual, 0 entities).

This library tags the matter as insider trading and price manipulation, based on the conduct the regulator describes. Each tag links to a page explaining how that technique works, what statute it engages, and what penalties comparable actions have attracted. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's: agencies charge statutory provisions, not technique names.

The conduct is recorded against equities, with Nasdaq identified in the release.

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.

Outcome. ASIC's later releases show that Evans pleaded guilty on 3 August 2022 to one count of conspiring to manipulate the price of Quantum shares (release 22-208MR). On 31 January 2023 the Supreme Court of Western Australia sentenced him to 12 months' imprisonment, to be served by release on entering a A$5,000 recognisance with a two-year good-behaviour condition (release 23-017MR). ASIC says the conviction also disqualifies him from managing corporations for five years. The court found that he, Kimelman and Benjamin Heath Cooper used a group chat to coordinate trades on 16 November 2015 to lift the share price.

What the sources do not show: the 23-017MR release describes the sentence for the manipulation conspiracy only. It does not say what became of the insider trading counts listed in the original charge release, and this record has not confirmed whether they were withdrawn. The record lists only Evans; Kimelman and Cooper were separate matters.

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.

• Insider trading — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.
• Price manipulation — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2020-09-28 ASIC media release
2. 2022-08-03 Evans pleads guilty to conspiring to manipulate Quantum shares (ASIC 22-208MR)
3. 2023-01-31 Evans sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment, released on recognisance (ASIC 23-017MR)

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
• ASIC release 22-208MR (guilty plea)
• ASIC release 23-017MR (sentence)

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 2 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.