SEC v. Milan Patel (false rumors, 2023)

Judgment entered

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In February 2023 the SEC charged Milan Patel with spreading more than 100 false rumors about public companies and trading on the resulting price rises. On April 11, 2025 the court entered a final judgment ordering disgorgement of $1,125,263 plus $395,309 of prejudgment interest. The SEC release also reports that Patel pleaded guilty in a parallel criminal case and received an 18-month prison sentence.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

—

Disgorgement

$1.1m

Prejudgment interest

$395k

Total relief

$1.5m

Alleged gain

$1m

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 Securities and Exchange Commission announced this matter on February 16, 2023 as release LR-25641. The respondents named are Milan Patel (1 individual, 0 entities).

This library tags the matter as false rumors, 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 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.

On April 11, 2025 the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia entered a final judgment against Patel, as reported in SEC release LR-26283. The judgment permanently enjoins him from violating the antifraud provisions and orders disgorgement of $1,125,263 plus prejudgment interest of $395,309. The release states that Patel pleaded guilty in a parallel criminal case brought by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Georgia and was sentenced to eighteen months in prison. The release does not say whether the civil judgment was by consent or after contest, and it names no civil penalty.

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.

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

Timeline

1. 2023-02-16 Litigation release published
2. 2025-04-11 Final judgment entered (N.D. Ga.): injunction, disgorgement and prejudgment interest

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
• SEC litigation release on final judgment

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.

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.