SEC v. Lanny Brown, et al. (insider trading, 2017)

Settled

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In December 2017 the SEC charged a former International Rectifier employee, Lanny Brown, and his friend Sean Fox with trading call options before Infineon's takeover of the company, making $369,720. Both consented to a judgment, subject to court approval, for joint and several disgorgement of $369,720 plus $43,148 interest.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

—

Disgorgement

$370k

Prejudgment interest

$43.1k

Total relief

$413k

Alleged gain

—

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 complaint alleged that Brown learned of the planned acquisition, tipped Fox, and that the two bought call options through an account in Fox's name, with about $12,000 of combined funds, to hide Brown's role. Fox allegedly closed the positions after the announcement and paid Brown's share by covering his expenses and writing checks to his family.

The settlement, subject to court approval, imposes injunctions and joint and several disgorgement of $369,720 plus interest of $43,147.79, with credit for amounts paid in the parallel criminal case.

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.

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

Timeline

1. 2017-12-14 Litigation release published

Primary documents

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

• SEC litigation release

The linked release is a work of the United States government and is not subject to copyright. 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 September 10, 2026. submit a correction.