SEC v. Stefan Lumiere (mismarking, 2018)

Judgment entered

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In March 2018 the SEC reported a final judgment and industry bar against hedge fund manager Stefan Lumiere, who with Christopher Plaford used sham broker quotes to mismark up to 28 securities a month for 18 months, inflating a fund's reported returns and fees. Lumiere was convicted at trial and sentenced to 18 months in prison and a $1 million criminal fine; the release states no civil money figure.

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 Securities and Exchange Commission announced this outcome on March 5, 2018 as litigation release LR-24061, in SEC v. Lumiere, No. 16 Civ. 4513 in the Southern District of New York, filed June 15, 2016. The defendant is Stefan Lumiere (1 individual, 0 entities).

The complaint alleged that Lumiere and fellow manager Christopher Plaford falsely inflated the value of securities held by a hedge fund their firm advised. For 18 months they allegedly gave brokers the prices they wanted, by cell phone or by flash drive delivered by courier, and used the resulting sham quotes to mismark as many as 28 securities a month, so that the fund reported inflated returns and net asset values and paid millions in inflated management and performance fees.

A court entered final judgment on February 20, 2018 enjoining Lumiere from violating Section 10(b), Rule 10b-5, Advisers Act Sections 206(1), 206(2) and 206(4) and Rule 206(4)-8, and the Commission barred him from the securities industry on February 28 based on the judgment and his conviction. In the parallel criminal case he was convicted after trial and sentenced to 18 months in prison, three years of supervised release and a $1 million fine; the fine is criminal and is not recorded as a civil penalty. Plaford pleaded guilty and the SEC's case against him was stayed.

For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary document linked above.

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.

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

Timeline

1. 2018-03-05 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 20, 2026. submit a correction.