The sale is prompting some serious questions, especially considering that under Obama, new legislation
was passed that prevented using classified information for stock market insider trading.
Career politicians seem to make millions supposedly ‘serving’ the American people, but many people
argue that it often seems like they’re only serving themselves to a bigger slice of the profits.
In a strange incident, Senator Dianne Feinstein (who also had a Chinese spy on her payroll for over 20) YEARS)
saved herself a boatload of money by reportedly selling stocks worth millions just days before
the coronavirus outbreak caused the market to fall.
Fox News reported:
The data is listed on a U.S. Senate website containing financial disclosures from Senate members.
Feinstein, who serves as ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and her husband sold
between $1.5 million and $6 million in stock in California biotech company Allogene Therapeutics,
between Jan. 31 and Feb. 18, The New York Times reported.
When questioned by the newspaper, a spokesman for the Democrat from San Francisco said Feinstein wasn’t directly
involved in the sale.
Utopian Reports
“All of Senator Feinstein’s assets are in a blind trust,” the spokesman, Tom Mentzer, told the Times.
“She has no involvement in her husband’s financial decisions.”
“All of Senator Feinstein’s assets are in a blind trust.
She has no involvement in her husband’s financial decisions.”
— Tom Mentzer, Feinstein spokesman
Reports identified the three other senators as Richard Burr of North Carolina,
Kelly Loeffler of Georgia and James Inhofe of Oklahoma, all Republicans.
Burr, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, used more than 30 transactions to dump
between $628,000 and $1.72 million on Feb. 13, according to ProPublica.
The report said the transactions involved a significant percentage of the senator’s holdings and
took place about a week before the impact of the virus outbreak sent stock prices plunging to the
point where gains made during President Trump’s term in office were largely erased.
“Senator Burr filed a financial disclosure form for personal transactions made several weeks before the U.S.
and financial markets showed signs of volatility due to the growing coronavirus outbreak,” a Burr spokesperson said.
“As the situation continues to evolve daily, he has been deeply concerned by the steep and sudden
toll this pandemic is taking on our economy.”
Burr was an author of the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Act, a law that helps determine the federal
response to situations such as the coronavirus outbreak, ProPublica reported.
Burr’s office would not comment on what kind of information Burr might have received about coronavirus
prior to his stock sales, the outlet reported.
NPR reported that Burr made ominous comments about coronavirus behind closed doors last month.
“There’s one thing that I can tell you about this: It is much more aggressive in its transmission than
anything that we have seen in recent history,”
Burr said at a Feb. 27 meeting of business leaders in Washington.
“It is probably more akin to the 1918 pandemic.”
Loeffler was appointed to the Senate in December by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp after incumbent Sen. Johnny
Isakson resigned because of health issues – despite allies of President Trump having urged Kemp to
select Rep. Doug Collins instead.
Loeffler and her husband, Jeffrey Sprecher, chairman of the New York Stock Exchange, sold
stock Jan. 24, the same day she sat in on a briefing from two members of Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force,
The Daily Beast reported.
Between that day and Feb. 14, the couple sold stock worth a total between $1.2 million and $3.1 million,
the report said.
In addition to the sales, they also purchased stock in a maker of software that helps people work at
home – just before millions of Americans were forced to leave their offices because of the outbreak, the report said.
Loeffler slammed the Daily Beast report as a
“ridiculous and baseless attack” in a pair of late-night tweets.
“This is a ridiculous and baseless attack.
I do not make investment decisions for my portfolio.
Investment decisions are made by multiple third-party advisors without my or my husband’s knowledge
or involvement,” Loeffler wrote.
“As confirmed in the periodic transaction report to Senate Ethics, I was informed of these purchases and sales
on February 16, 2020 — three weeks after they were made.”
Inhofe sold as much as $400,000 in stock all on Jan. 27, in companies such as PayPal,
Apple and real estate company Brookfield Asset Management, The New York Times reported.
Incidentally, Feinstein and others voted to make this sort of activity illegal under Obama.
From Wikipedia:
The Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act (Pub.L. 112–105, S. 2038, 126 Stat. 291, enacted April 4, 2012)
is an Act of Congress designed to combat insider trading.
It was signed into law by President Barack Obama on April 4, 2012.
The bill prohibits the use of non-public information for private profit, including insider trading by members
of Congress and other government employees.
It confirms changes to the Commodity Exchange Act, specifies reporting intervals for financial transactions.
The bill was introduced by Joe Lieberman, independent United States Senator for Connecticut, on January 26, 2012,
and passed in the Senate by a 96–3 vote.
Later the House of Representatives passed it by a 417–2 vote.
The bill was supported heavily by vulnerable incumbents and signed into law by President Obama.
According to the current United States Senate Select Committee on Ethics,
“A member, officer, or employee of the Senate shall not receive any compensation,
nor shall he permit any compensation to accrue to his beneficial interest from any source,
the receipt or accrual of which would occur by virtue of influence improperly exerted from his position
as a member, officer, or employee.”
The maximum prison sentence for an insider trading violation is now 20 years.
The maximum criminal fine for individuals is now $5,000,000, and the maximum fine for non-natural persons
(such as an entity whose securities are publicly traded) is now $25,000,000.
Courtesy by Georgette
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