were little changed Friday morning after the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
announced insider trading charges against a former employee.
An ex-Amazon financial analyst named Brett Kennedy allegedly leaked privileged information to a college friend of his heading into an earnings report, the SEC said. The college friend, Maziar Rezakhani, went on to earn an illegal profit trading Amazon's stock and is also charged in the SEC's complaint.
Kennedy allegedly made use of nonpublic data relating to Amazon's first-quarter 2015 earnings, which resulted in Rezakhani earning a profit of more than $116,000, the SEC continued. In return, Kennedy was given $10,000 in cash for the tip.
Rezakhani also shared part of the profit with Sam Sadeghi, an individual who helped him on his brokerage account trades.
Rezakhani participated in at least two online trading communities and said it was "so obvious" what Amazon would report in the quarter that even a "5 year old can guess what they will do."
Settlement Reached
Without admitting wrongdoing, Sadeghi and Kennedy will pay a settlement of $11,599.74 plus $1,035.39 in interest and an $11,599.74 penalty for a total of $24,214.87, the SEC also said.
Kennedy will also face criminal charges from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Washington.
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