MARKET MANIPULATION

Market Manipulation refers to the deliberate attempt to interfere with the free and fair operation of a market to create artificial prices for a security, commodity, or currency. Market manipulation may take a variety of forms. US courts take the view that a test of manipulation must largely be a practical one because the methods and techniques of manipulation are limited only by the ingenuity of man.

WEFA, LLC Principals have experience designing peer-reviewed academic research to create “but for” price benchmarks to test for artificiality in market prices in both security and commodity markets.

Related Work

Josef A. Kohen, Breakwater Trading LLC, and Richard Hershey, Plaintiffs, v. Pacific Investment Management Company LLC, and PIMCO Funds, Defendants (United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, No. 05 C 4681).  WEFA, LLC Principal John Merrick acted as expert for Plaintiffs’ lawyers, Lovell Stewart Halebian Jacobson LLP.

Related Publications

“Financial Intermediaries in the Midst of Market Manipulation: Did They Protect the Fool or Help the Knave?" Journal of Corporate Finance, forthcoming.

“Strategic Trading Behavior and Price Distortion in a Manipulated Market: Anatomy of a Squeeze,” Journal of Financial Economics, 77 (1), 171-218, 2005.