Morgan Stanley hit with criminal charges and $249 million fine for alleged block-trading fraud

Morgan Stanley’s pitch to sellers looking to unload big blocks of stock was that their block-trading unit was the best at preventing leaks that could drive share prices down.But federal prosecutors and the Securities and Exchange Commission now say it was all a lie, and that from 2018 through 2021 the bank would quietly divulge news of the impending block trades to hedge funds as a way of lessening its own risk. The result was that sellers would lose millions of dollars on the deal, investigators said.In si ...