Ex-Kepler Analyst Who Traded on Memos Cleared of Insider Trading

A former equity analyst made more than 34,000 euros ($38,000) in an hour by investing in Vallourec SA a day before he published a recommendation raising the French company to “outperform” was cleared of an insider-trading charge but fined and banned for failing to disclose the investment to his readers.

The Autorite des Marches Financiers’s enforcement committee dismissed investigator’s allegations that former Kepler Cheuvreux SA analyst Geoffroy Stern benefited from insider information when he made 28 trades based on draft recommendations made by him and others that the brokerage was set to publish hours later.

The AMF underscored investigator’s failure ...