Andrew Left Case Maps New Fraud Frontier: California Brief

Left Verdict Points to New Fraud Frontier

Andrew Left, founder of Citron Research, center right, exits federal court in Los Angeles

Photographer: Dania Maxwell/Bloomberg

Andrew Left’s conviction this month in a social-media-based securities fraud case reflects the government’s efforts to apply traditional fraud principles to markets shaped by online influence, retail trading communities, and personality-driven investing, Sullivan & Cromwell’s John Liolos and Sam Bonafede write in a Bloomberg Law Insight.

US v. Left isn’t an isolated case, they add. The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in October revived charges alleging traders used social media to induce securities purchases through misleading statements about their trading activity. And in September, a jury found a ...