Insider Information. Ethics and Personal Morals.

[AIRider]

What would you have done.

I have a few friends in low places with big ears. They hear and know things, they are not board members but are in the know about their own respected companies. Let's just say the information they have is useable.

I have never relied, nor asked them ever about any of it, but we do share ideas and shoot sh|t about the stock market etc. We are all good guys, with good morals, and I wouldn't call us greedy.

But let's just say that two weeks ago, one guy slipped some info, and to keep it short, $10000 would have been worth $17500 today.

Now I look at this and say, whatever, it's cheating, and I'm not a cheater. Plus it's not worth going to jail for it.

But then I ask myself, there must be a sh|t load of people who wouldn't think twice about it.

What do you think?

[GoFaster]

I think, regardless of right or wrong, that it happens all the time.

[a_riot]

If you become aware of nonpublic information that could influence the stock price and trade on it, you could be charged if caught.

[AIRider]

If you become aware of nonpublic information that could influence the stock price and trade on it, you could be charged if caught.

Of course, and I'll never take the chance, I don't think I'm that kind of person.

But I can see how one could get enticed into it.

[sdpauly]

I think most of the insider trading laws are wrong-headed anyway.

Certain members of our government have been known to engage in it quite blatantly and have grown quite rich from it. But they seem to have some kind of blanket immunity so they never get prosecuted for it... Meanwhile, Martha Stewart goes to jail.

[You are to blame]

Follow the gut all the time

[westsideseal]

OP: Kudos for maintaining your integrity. I'm of the opinion that the stock market is basically a rigged game anyway, so it wouldn't be too difficult for someone to use the "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" rationale. I'm not in the market aside from 401k, so I can't say what I would do in your situation, but a cool 75% return would be extremely tempting.

[ValveCoverGasket]

do it, youre talking about fractions of a penny relative to the amounts traded on inside information by hedge funds and other large institutions.

[mAdD INDIAN]

Senators have no problems with insider trading. In fact, it is legal for them!

I never understood how that was legal for all these years.

[Double-V]

Cops let each other off all the time for speeding as a "professional courtesy" - should be no different for insider trading!

[AZGolf]

I never understood how that was legal for all these years.

Congress regularly writes laws to exempt congress from being subject to said laws. There are many, many cases of this.

[1Point8TDan]

I think, regardless of right or wrong, that it happens all the time.

I just want to add that there are much worse things in the world. The reason the rich are rich is because they communicate information to each other.