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Spoofing gold market was common at Bear Stearns, former trader testifies

Section: Daily Dispatches

By Eddie Spence
Bloomberg News
Monday, July 18, 2022

At Bear Stearns Cos., before the bank was acquired by JPMorgan Chase & Co. in 2008, manipulating the gold futures market with bogus spoof orders was "common practice," especially for its top trader, Gregg Smith, a former colleague told jurors in Chicago.

"It was pretty widespread" on the precious-metals trading desk, said Corey Flaum, a gold and silver trader who was later fired for spoofing and reached a criminal plea agreement to cooperate with prosecutors. 

... Dispatch continues below ...


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"It was done out in the open," Flaum said today. "Nobody ever said boo about doing it. No one ever said it was legal or illegal. It was common practice."

Smith, who became JPMorgan's top gold trader after the merger, is on trial with two others on the desk: Jeffrey Ruffo, a salesman who handled orders by the bank's biggest hedge fund clients, and Michael Nowak, the longtime head of the JPMorgan precious-metals business. They are accused of operating a criminal enterprise by manipulating prices from 2008 to 2016. ...

... For the remainder of the report:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-18/spoofing-gold-common-practice-at-bear-stearns-ex-trader-says

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