Disgraced former hedge fund manager Julian Rifat jailed for insider trading

Rifat was sentenced to 19 months in jail for taking part in a £285,000 insider trading scandal

Rifat will have to pay £260,000 in fines and costs after admitting to passing on information about eight companies including Barclays and Volkswagen (REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett)

The disgraced former hedge fund manager Julian Rifat was yesterday sentenced to 19 months in jail for taking part in a £285,000 insider trading scandal.

Rifat, who worked at Moore Capital, will also have to pay £260,000 in fines and costs after admitting to passing on information about eight companies, including Barclays and Volkswagen, to an associate, Graeme Shelley, who worked as a broker at Novum Securities.

The insider trading scheme funded an extravagant lifestyle for Rifat, including luxury holidays and flashy cars. It was conducted on pay-as-you-go mobile phones but caught up with the father-of-three in 2010 when he was arrested on his 41st birthday at his Oxfordshire home.

The dawn raid was part of Operation Tabernula, the financial regulator’s largest insider trading investigation to date. The Financial Conduct Authority said it is prosecuting another seven individuals for insider dealing. Georgina Philippou, acting director of enforcement and market oversight at FCA, added: “[Rifat’s] behaviour exploited financial markets at a particularly challenging time as they were taking steps to recover from the 2008 crisis.”

Judge McCreath at Southwark Crown Court said that Rifat had acted “deliberately and dishonestly”.

Shelley also pleaded guilty to insider trading last year, receiving a two-year suspended sentence.