East Brunswick Man, Bristol-Myers Squibb Exec Sentenced for Insider Trading

An East Brunswick man and former executive at Bristol-Myers Squibb was sentenced to a year and a day in prison for insider trading that net him $311,361, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced on Wednesday.

Robert Ramnarine, 46, previously pleaded guilty to an information charging him with securities fraud for trading inside information involving a company Bristol-Myers Squibb was in the process of acquiring.

He will also serve two years of supervised release and a $10,000 fine. He forfeited $324,777 to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Ramnarine was employed at Bristol-Myers Squibb from 1997 until August of 2012, Fishman said.

Beginning in March of 2008, he held a number of high-level jobs, including director of Pensions and Savings Investments (March 2008-June 2011); executive director of Pensions and Savings Investments (June 2011-July 2012); and assistant treasurer for Capital Markets (July 2012-August 2012), all of which allowed him to evaluate the company’s potential acquisitions, Fishman said.

This included inside information on publicly traded companies, and he was banned from disclosing confidential information and material, nonpublic information he learned through his employment or from using such information for his personal benefit or the benefit of others, Fishman said.

Nevertheless, Ramnarine stood accused of trading material, nonpublic information about Amylin Pharmaceuticals Inc., a publicly traded company Bristol-Myers Squibb was in the process of acquiring. He was able to make a substantial profit by trading Amylin stock options before Bristol-Myers Squibb announced its plans to acquire the company in June of 2012.

He also made profits off trading on ZymoGenetics Inc. and Pharmasset Inc., which Gilead Sciences subsequently acquired.

Fishman credited special agents of the FBI, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Aaron T. Ford in Newark, with the investigation leading to the sentence. He also thanked the SEC’s Market Abuse Unit and Philadelphia Regional Office, under the direction of Daniel M. Hawke, for its assistance, and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., for its cooperation during the investigation.

This case was brought in coordination with President Barack Obama’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force, which was formed to wage an aggressive, coordinated and proactive effort to investigate and prosecute financial crimes.