Tottenham’s billionaire owner Joe Lewis charged in US with insider trading
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Tottenham Hotspur owner Joe Lewis (left) and chairman Daniel Levy in the stands during a match.
PHOTO: REUTERS
NEW YORK – British billionaire Joe Lewis, the owner of the Tottenham Hotspur soccer club in London, has been charged with insider trading in the United States.
Federal prosecutors alleged in an indictment in New York that the 86-year-old passed on inside information from companies in which he was an investor to friends, including his personal pilots, assistants, and romantic partners.
Mr Lewis, the founder of investment firm the Tavistock Group, faces more than a dozen charges, including securities fraud.
“None of this was necessary, Joe Lewis was a wealthy man,” Mr Damian Williams, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a statement on Tuesday.
“But, as we allege, he used inside information as a way to compensate his employees or shower gifts on his friends and lovers.”
Prosecutors allege he was engaged in insider trading for eight years, passing on material non-public information about several companies, including Solid Biosciences, Australian Agricultural and Mirati Therapeutics, in which Tavistock had an interest. In some instances, Mr Lewis allegedly loaned money to those he tipped, the authorities said.
A call and e-mail to Tavistock’s media team after hours were not immediately returned.
Mr Lewis, who has a net worth of US$6.5 billion (S$8.6 billion) according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, is the latest figure to be swept up in an insider trading crackdown led by federal prosecutors in Manhattan.
In June, prosecutors announced criminal charges against 10 people in four separate cases, including investors in a special acquisition company poised to take Donald Trump’s fledgling media company public.
But Mr Lewis is the highest-profile investor the office has prosecuted for insider trading in 2023. The Bahamas-based businessman’s firm has stakes in more than 200 businesses, with investments across real estate, hotels and sports, in 13 countries.
The Spurs arrived in Singapore on Monday, and will take on the Sailors in the Tiger Cup on Wednesday evening in the inaugural Singapore Festival of Football. BLOOMBERG
