Still no charges for SAC’s Steve Cohen.
FORTUNE — The government has yet to accuse SAC Capital founder Steve Cohen of a crime, but on Tuesday Cohen was directly tied to an insider trading scheme for the first time as part of a case against a trader named Mathew Martoma.
Charges unsealed in civil and criminal cases accuse Martoma of obtaining inside information about a drug test conducted by Elan, and then directing his hedge fund boss to dump the pharmaceutical company’s stock before the test results were announced. That hedge fund boss, according to the Wall Street Journal, is none other than Steve Cohen, and Martoma’s firm CR Intrinsic was a subsidiary of SAC.
The development feels momentous because it was seemingly a long time coming. Ever since the government crackdown on insider trading began three years ago, enough former and current SAC employees have been implicated in insider trading schemes that people wondered whether Cohen and his firm would be accused of wrongdoing. Senator Charles Grassley last year asked the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to look into suspicious trades made by the $14 billion firm. Grassley argued that the trades “raise serious questions about the corporate culture at SAC Capital and undercut investor confidence in a fair and balanced playing field.”
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Now a shot has been fired directly across Cohen’s bow. As the government closes in on Cohen and SAC, here’s a look at the string of former employees that the government uncovered, drawing investigators closer to Cohen.
Choo Beng Lee: Lee was a former SAC analyst who pled guilty to two counts of insider trading. His cooperation agreement implies that he acted improperly while employed by SAC, even though the crimes that brought him down took place after he’d left the firm. Lee tried to get rehired by Cohen while he was working with prosecutors as part of the government’s investigation.
Noah Freeman: Freeman is a former SAC analyst who became a cooperating witness for the government after being accused of insider trading while at Cohen’s firm. His work helped to ensnare his friend and fellow SAC alum Donald Longueil.
Donald Longueil: Longueil was an analyst at SAC subsidiary CR Intrinsic (the same unit where Maroma worked). He pled guilty to insider trading while at Cohen’s firm after telling his friend Noah Freeman that he’d destroyed his computer’s hard drive and spread the pieces among several dumpsters throughout Manhattan.
Jon Horvath: Horvath worked as a tech analyst at SAC subsidiary Sigma Capital Management. He was arrested along with Anthony Chiasson, a fellow SAC alum and founder of Level Global. Horvath pled guilty to insider trading. He’s now cooperating with the government.
Michael Steinberg: Steinberg was Jon Horvath’s superviser at Sigma Capital. He’s still employed at SAC, but was recently put on leave. Steinberg is listed as an unindicted co-conspirator in the insider trading scheme that involved Horvath.
Jonathan Hollander: Hollander also worked at CR Intrinsic. He settled with the government after being accused of using inside information to trade stocks in his personal account, rather than for SAC.
Anthony Chiasson: Chiasson is an ex-SAC trader who is currently on trial for insider trading at the firm he co-founded in 2003, Level Global. As part of his defense, Chiasson’s lawyers are trying to show that fellow SAC alum and Level Global co-founder David Ganek made trades that were similar to those made by Chiasson.