This archive report was first published on 22 May 2020.
On May 22, 2020, the Capital Markets Authority (CMA) filed an affidavit in the Capital Markets Tribunal seeking to dismiss an appeal by Andre DeSimone, former CEO of Kestrel Capital, over the KenolKobil insider trading case.
DeSimone was banned from holding a senior role in a listed firm or a brokerage for a year and fined Sh2.5 million for sharing price-sensitive information in the KenolKobil deal.
The CMA argues that DeSimone's appeal is time-barred, as the law requires a demand for an appeal to be made within 15 days, and DeSimone filed his appeal more than nine months after the punishment was meted out.
DeSimone had argued that the regulator failed to establish that he profited from the leaked information and that the evidence before the regulator does not meet the threshold for insider trading.
However, the CMA claims that DeSimone admitted to disclosing price-sensitive material to two stockbrokers who then used it to trade 59.8 million shares and would have gained Sh481.2 million from the illegal trades.
DeSimone had also deleted WhatsApp messages, call records, and text messages from his seized BlackBerry mobile phone and edited Mr. Satchu's response to the regulator on the insider trading allegations in an attempt to cover up the breach.
