Four men, including a relative of the King of Jordan, have been charged with insider trading in connection to a $1 million stock trading scheme related to a business acquisition by MasTec, a publicly traded company based in South Florida, ABC News reports.
The individuals charged are Federico Nannini, 26, his father Mauro Nannini, 63, along with two friends, Alejandro Thermiotis, 26, and Francisco Tonarely, 25. The charges include one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and 24 related offenses, according to a federal indictment. Thermiotis is a relative of King Abdullah II of Jordan, as his brother, Jameel, is married to Princess Iman, the daughter of the King. The Jordanian Royal Palace has not commented on the charges.
According to the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, the defendants allegedly conspired to use confidential information to trade stocks in Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives (IEA), an Indiana-based company that MasTec was planning to acquire. The indictment claims that the group shared this inside information among themselves to purchase shares of IEA at a lower price and later sold them for a substantial profit once the acquisition was publicly announced.
The alleged insider trading scheme began in June 2022, when Federico Nannini, a consultant, gained access to confidential details about MasTec’s planned acquisition. He then shared this information with his father and Thermiotis, a close friend. Thermiotis passed along the details to Tonarely, their mutual friend. All three younger defendants had attended Gulliver Preparatory School in Miami together.
Prosecutors claim that after learning about the planned acquisition, Mauro Nannini bought shares in IEA. As the acquisition progressed, the group continued to trade on the confidential information, allegedly selling their shares at a profit after the acquisition became public on July 25, 2022.
In addition to the criminal charges, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed a parallel civil lawsuit in Miami federal court. The defendants made their first court appearances on Friday.
If convicted, they face serious penalties. The conspiracy charge carries a potential sentence of up to five years in prison, while the related securities fraud offenses could result in sentences of up to 25 years for each count.
