More Trading Activity at Bwin.Party Raises Eyebrows

As first reported by Gambling911.com on Friday, at least one Director in publicly traded Bwin.Party bought shares immediately after earnings.  Within a day of those shares purchases, the company started to buy back shares in the open market.

Helmut Kern, Non Executive Director, bought 60,000 shares in the company on the 3rd September 2014, just one day prior, at a price of 92.42p. The Director now holds 60,000 shares.

“On the surface, there should be red flags raised here,” a Gambling911.com source following the unusual trading activity suggested.

That’s because this could be perceived as front running, whereby a stockbroker executing orders on a security for its own account while taking advantage of advance knowledge of pending orders from its customers.

When orders previously submitted by its customers will predictably affect the price of the security, purchasing first for its own account gives the broker an unfair advantage, since it can expect to close out its position at a profit based on the new price level.

Overnight Sunday revelations surfaced that other executives in the company have made shares purchases over the past week, though these trades occurred a few days prior to the earnings report.  That list appears below.

“Why not let us shareholders buy before the executives do?” one investor balked after hearing of the trades.