SEC v. Robert W. Murray (price manipulation, 2017)

Settled

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In May 2017 the SEC charged Virginia engineer Robert W. Murray with manipulating Fitbit's stock through a fake EDGAR tender offer made in the name of ABM Capital LTD, after he bought call options and made about $3,100. He pleaded guilty in a parallel criminal case and was sentenced to two years in prison in March 2018. In July 2018 the SEC said he had agreed to settle its charges, subject to court approval.

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 SEC's complaint alleged that Murray bought Fitbit call options minutes before he filed a fake tender offer on EDGAR purporting that a sham company, ABM Capital LTD, would buy Fitbit shares at a premium, then sold the options for a profit of about $3,100 when the price briefly spiked. It also alleged he used an alias email account and an out-of-state IP address to hide his identity. The U.S. Attorney's Office announced parallel criminal charges the same day.

According to the SEC, Murray pleaded guilty on November 7, 2017 and on March 9, 2018 was sentenced to two years in prison. On July 17, 2018 the SEC announced that Murray had agreed to settle its charges, subject to court approval; a release of August 12, 2019 about co-defendant Mark Burns says Murray settled with the SEC. None of the releases states the date the court entered the judgment or what monetary relief it carried, so no amounts are recorded and the resolution date used here is the date the settlement was announced. The sentence is the criminal outcome and is recorded separately from the civil one. Checked on 2026-10-04.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with 3 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.

• EDGAR filing fraud — 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.
• Sham tender offers — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2017-05-19 Litigation release published
2. 2017-11-07 Murray pleads guilty in the parallel criminal case
3. 2018-03-09 Murray sentenced to two years in prison
4. 2018-07-17 SEC says Murray has agreed to settle, subject to court approval
5. 2019-08-12 SEC release on Burns judgment states Murray settled

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, guilty plea (LR-23983)
• SEC litigation release, sentence (LR-24075)
• SEC litigation release, Burns charged and Murray settlement (LR-24204)
• SEC litigation release, Burns judgment (LR-24557)

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 5 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 20, 2026. submit a correction.