📋 Tender Overview
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced insider trading charges against Amit Dagar a former Pfizer Inc. employee and his close friend and business partner Atul Bhiwapurkar for trading in advance of the companys November 5 2021 announcement that a randomized double-blind study of its COVID-19 antiviral treatment Paxlovid was successful. Following that announcement in which Pfizers CEO referred to the news as a game-changer in the global efforts to halt the devastation of the pandemic the companys stock price increased by nearly 11 percent the largest single-day price move in the stock since 2009.According to the SECs complaint Dagar was a senior statistical program lead for the Paxlovid drug trial which began in July 2021 as part of the companys efforts to address the global health pandemic. On the day before the Paxlovid announcement the complaint alleges Dagar learned material nonpublic information about the success of the trial. Specifically the SEC alleges that Dagars supervisor informed him via chat that we got the outcome there was a lot of work lined up and that there would be a press release tomorrow to which Dagar responded with oh really and kind of exciting. Several hours after that exchange Dagar allegedly purchased short term out-of-the-money Pfizer call options including options that expired the very next day and then tipped Bhiwapurkar who also purchased similar call options in Pfizer. The complaint alleges that Dagars and Bhiwapurkars trading generated approximately 214395 and 60300 respectively in illicit profits which amounted to one-day investment returns of 2458 percent and 791 percent.The case originated from the SECs Market Abuse Units Analysis and Detection Center which uses data analysis tools to detect suspicious trading patterns.As alleged in our complaint Amit Dagar misused his access to confidential clinical trial results to enrich himself and his friend Atul Bhiwapurkar said Joseph Sansone Chief of the Market Abuse Unit. Dagar and Bhiwapurkar allegedly leveraged this information by trading out-of-the-money call options to generate massive one-day returns. Thanks to our surveillance the defendants must now face the consequences of their greed.
