Teen defends stock promotion actions. 16-year-old settled with SEC for $285,000
By Steve Gelsi, CBS.MarketWatch.com
Last Update: 4:00 PM ET Oct 19, 2000 NewsWatch
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NEW YORK (CBS.MW) - A 16-year-old who settled SEC charges over alleged pump and dump schemes that netted him about $800,000 said in his first interview that he didn't do anything wrong.
Jonathan Lebed told CBS's "60 Minutes" that, "I wasn't posting any kind of false information" and that the stocks he plugged under assumed names resulted from genuine research on his part.
The segment is scheduled to air on Sunday.
Lebed's father Greg Lebed said, at least Jonathan "didn't sit behind a garage smoking pot, or stealing wheels off a car."
The family has a new $40,000 Mercedes, thanks to Jonathan.
Lebed, the youngest person ever to be charged with illegal stock dealing, promised the Securities and Exchange Commission to stop manipulating stock prices.
He turned over $285,000 to the SEC to settle civil charges that he committed fraud in stock deals that netted him $800,000.
SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt pointed out that Lebed "used fictitious names. He made predictions . . . without any foundation.
"The purpose . . .was not to help investors. . . but rather to line his own pockets as soon as he hyped the price of the stock."
Lebed's lawyer Kevin Marino said "I don't think . . .you could draw a principled distinction between what he did and what is done every single day of the week on Wall Street."
The SEC said Sept. 20 that it settled fraud charges with then-15-year-old Lebed. It was the first time the SEC ever brought charges against a minor.
The Cedar Grove, N.J. teen settled charges without admitting or denying the findings.
The SEC charged Lebed with carrying out a plan on 11 separate occasions to buy a block of a thinly-traded microcap.
Within hours of making the purchase, Lebed sent "numerous false and/or misleading e-mail messages" primarily to various Yahoo Finance message boards, touting the shares he had just bought, the SEC said.
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