From being a very successful businesswoman to calling a prison cell home, Martha Stewart has definitely had an interesting past couple of years. She started her career about 30 years ago with a catering business and has since built from that becoming the CEO and Chairman of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc. Her success also includes the publication of her magazine Everyday Living, being the commercial spokeswoman for K-Mart, and having her own popular television show, From Martha’s Kitchen. She had built the reputation of being a public figure with how-to advice on creations in the kitchen to gardening. Despite these accomplishments, Stewart managed to become entangled in some insider trading scheme that damaged not only parts of her career, but also her public image.
Insider trading is the act of purchasing or selling securities based on material, nonpublic information. Information is consider to be material if a reasonable person would use it in such a way that would persuade them to partake in an exchange of securities, or if it was reasonable to believe that it would affect the market price of a security once the information has become public (Carlin 2003). Information can only be acted upon once it has been made public, otherwise, unfair trades would take place that could negatively affect the general public and shareholders of the company. Those who are employees of the company upon employment have a signed agreement to put the interests of the shareholders first. Acting on tips from within the company or other sources could negatively affect the corporation’s success, resulting in a shareholders loss.
Martha Stewart became involved with an insider trading scandal back in December of 2001. Suspicion came abo...
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... of her own. The homemaker, Martha Stewart, committed an illegal act of insider trading which made her a new home in prison.
Works Cited
Caillavet, Cynthia A. (2004). From Nike v. Kasky to Martha Stewart: First Amendment Protection for Corporate Speakers’ Denials of Public Criminal Allegations. Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology, 94 (4), 1033-1067. Retrieved December 5, 2006 from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=afh&AN=15385502&site=ehost-live
Securities and Exchange Commission, Litigation. (2003). Complaint: Martha Stewart and Peter Bacanovic. Retrieved December 11, 2006 from http://sec.gov/litigation/complaints/comp18169.htm
Shaw, Nancy (2003). Martha Stewart Does Insider Trading. Social Text, 21 (4), 51-67. Retrieved December 5, 2006 from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=afh&AN=12173672&site=ehost-live
...: Wall Street Insider - Financial News, Headlines, Commentary and Analysis - Hedge Funds, Private Equity, Banks. Retrieved January 15, 2012, from http://dealbreaker.com/2010/06/wachovia-vp-had-good-reason-to-steal-money-from-bank-that-youll-probably-never-understand/
She also invested in several companies including Squatty Potty, Readerest, Paint Brush Cover, Hold Your Haunches, Drop Stop, and FiberFix.
The jury convicted Stewart of making false statements to investigators during her February 4 interview, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001. The jury found Stewart guilty of making the following false statements, each of which was a specification in Count Three of the Indictment. Martha Stewart told the Government investigators that she spoke to Peter Bacanovic on December 27 and instructed him to sell her ImClone shares after he informed her that ImClone was trading below $ 60 per share. Martha also stated that during the same telephone call, she and Peter Bacanovic discussed the performance of the stock of her own company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia ("MSLO"), and discussed K-Mart. She told investigators that she had decided to sell her ImClone shares at that time because she did not want to be bothered during her vacation. Stewart stated that she did not know if there was any record of a telephone message left by Peter Bacanovic on December 27 in her assistant's message log.
Jordan Belfort is famous for his crooked way of earning his millions as a stockbroker on Wall Street. Even Belfort started at the bottom, on his first day in Wall Street he was told he was “lower than pond scum”(Belfort 1). After writing a book about his happenings on Wall Street, we’ve seen the
She could be homemaker and help with the finances too. Her success started by using $495 dollars of wedding gift money to place a mail order ad in Seventeen magazine selling an inexpensive leather belt with matching purse that she herself had designed. As a hook, she offered to moaker in the Chelsea district of New York, manufactured the two items for around $3 dollars. The purse and belt came in black, tan, or red and sold for $7 dollars.(Youman, N, 1989, pg 26) After 6 weeks of advertising Lillian had received over $16 thousand dollars in mail orders. Her belt and purse were such a hit, she immediately increased her inventory to inexpensive jewelry and make-up paraphernalia.
In Karen Hos’ Liquidated, she aims to study the relationships between corporate America and the world’s greatest financial center. . . Wall Street. The. She puts all her three years of research in her ethnography and thus on the very first page of chapter one, we can already understand Hos’ determination to understand what Wall Street is all about. The first main theme explained is the relations on Wall Street that are based on a culture of domination of staff members, their irresponsibility dealing with corporate America, and constant changes that occur during this process.
Sullivan case was a relevant precedent. This is the case that originally used the term ?actual malice? and decided that it had to be proven as actual malice before any press reports about public officials or any celebrities could be considered as libel. Jerry Falwell actually won the case in a lower court, but when it got to the Supreme Court, they overruled it in favor of Hustler Magazine and Larry Flynt (the owner of Hustler Magazine). There was no dissenting opinions because the case was unanimous in favor of Hustler. The only concurring opinion was from Justice White. He believed that this case was in no way related to the New York Times v. Sullivan because it had ?no assertion of fact?, but says that the company cannot be penalized due to the First Amendment. (Hustler Magazine v. Falwell,
is now seeing that she is being followed by men who work for Fenston finance and she is
Years later down the road, she also was a millionaire and had owned a mansion in
Although many of her actions were parallel with fellow manager in General Accounting Troy Nordmand’s, he did not receive a prison sentence due to the fact that he attempted to leave the company (although Vinson did initially plan to resign). Conversely, Vinson was sentenced to five months in prison and five months of home detention. One particularly interesting aspect of Betty Vinson’s case is the inclusion of her concerns over taking home pay and having health insurance, in addition to the fact that she had a positive reputation and was known for doing “anything you told her”. While it is normal to have concerns over job security, the emotional appeals in her situation add a different side to the story. One could argue that she is a victim -- she could have been targeted due to her reputation, or that fear drove her to do things she otherwise would not have considered. The issue here, however, is that she facilitated the fulfillment of Sullivan’s requests and pleaded guilty to one count of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud. As far as the case specifies, despite any superior’s knowledge of Vinson’s tendencies, she was not absolutely forced to do or not do anything. Because she committed the crime and pleaded accordingly, the criminal charges and consequent sentencing was both expected and
Jordan Belfort is the notorious 1990’s stockbroker who saw himself earning fifty million dollars a year operating a penny stock boiler room from his Stratton Oakmont, Inc. brokerage firm. Corrupted by drugs, money, and sexuality he went from being an innocent twenty – two year old on the fringe of a new life to manipulating the system in his infamous “pump and dump” scheme. As a stock swindler, he would motivate his young brokers through insane presentations to rile them up as they defrauded investors with duplicitous stock sales. Toward the end of this debauchery tale he was convicted for securities fraud and money laundering for which he was sentenced to twenty – two months in prison as well as recompensing two – hundred million in restitution to any swindled stock buyers of his brokerage firm (A&E Networks Television). Though his lavish spending and berserk party lifestyle was consumed by excessive greed, he displayed both positive and negative aspects of business communications.
Mackay, Tim. "The Ethics Of The Wolf Of Wall Street." Charter 85.2 (2014): 67.Web. 23 Mar. 2014.
This case study is not about Ms. Stewart direct participation with illegal insider trading as the media had steered the public to believe. To begin, Ms. Stewart received a phone call from Ann Armstrong, her assistant, stating that Peter Bacanovic, her stockbroker, “thinks ImClone is going to start trading down.” (Arnold, Beauchamp, Bowie, 2013, p. 390) Although Ms. Stewart was not able to get a hold of Peter, she talked to his assistance, Douglas Faneuil,
Insider trading has been a commonly discussed topic since Martha Stewart was accused, tried, convicted, and served a prison term for her involvement with the Inclon trading scandal. However, the definition of the term “insider trading” is not necessarily always connected with illegal activity. As a matter of fact, in some jurisdictions, “insider trading” is no crime. Traditionally, it has been an expected, and perfectly acceptable prerequisite for certain sorts of employment. ”(Insider Trading).
Jordan Belfort is the notorious 1990’s stockbroker who saw himself earning fifty million dollars a year operating a penny stock boiler room from his Stratton Oakmont, Inc. brokerage firm. Corrupted by drugs, money, and sex, he went from being an innocent twenty – two year old on the fringe of a new life to manipulating the system in his infamous “pump and dump” scheme. As a stock swindler, he would motivate his young brokers through insane presentations to rile them up as they defrauded investors with duplicitous stock sales. Toward the end of this debauchery tale he was convicted for securities fraud and money laundering for which he was sentenced to twenty – two months in prison as well as recompensing two – hundred million in restitution to any swindled stock buyers of his brokerage firm. Though his lavish spending and berserk party lifestyle was consumed by excessive greed, he displayed both positive and negative aspects of business communications.