A Weston man who was employed by a Colorado-based investment company received a two-month federal prison sentence and was ordered to pay hundreds of thousands in fines for insider trading.
Ryan Squillante, 40, of Weston, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Vernon D. Oliver in Hartford to two months in prison, 18 months of supervised release and a $331,368 fine after pleading guilty to securities fraud on June 6, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Court records show that Squillante, who worked from his home, was employed as the head of equity trading at an investment company headquartered in Denver, Colorado. As part of his job, Squillante received material non-public information (MNPI) about publicly traded companies.
Investigators alleged that, on 15 different occasions between August 2022 and May 2023, Squillante used MNPI “for his own benefit by executing transactions in securities of these companies, making a total profit of $220,912,” according to court records.
Court records show that Squillante reportedly received MNPI about Praxis Precision Medicines, Inc., a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company whose common stock traded on the NASDAQ, in February 2023. “Between February 27 and March 2, 2023, Squillante ‘sold short’ 38,086 shares of Praxis at an average price per share of approximately $3.04,” according to court records. “On March 3, 2023, before the market opened, Praxis announced poor results from its drug trial, stating that the drug’s effects did not achieve its primary endpoint with statistical significance.”
Following the announcement, Squillante reportedly attempted to cover his short sale by purchasing 38,086 Praxis shares at an average price per share of approximately $1.82, making a profit of $46,421, court records show.
Squillante is scheduled to report to prison on Jan. 7, 2026.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation with the assistance of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
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