Inside trading pair must repay £1.5m

A City banker and his wife convicted of one of the biggest insider trading deals bought to a UK court have been ordered to repay more than £1.5 million they illegally obtained.

Christian Littlewood and his wife Angie were today each ordered to pay back the £767,000 they profited from during the scam, following a confiscation order bought by the Financial Services Authority (FSA).

Mr Littlewood, 37, a former senior investment banker, was jailed for three years and four months in 2011 for tipping off his wife to invest hundreds of thousands of pounds in companies when he learned their share price was set to increase.

Mrs Littlewood, 39, who traded under her Chinese name Siew Yoon Lew, was spared jail term and given a 12 month imprisonment suspended for two years.

The order will be paid out of funds and assets which were restrained by the court on the application of the FSA at the time of the Littlewoods arrest.

Alongside the couple, family friend Helmy Omar Sa'aid, 34, also admitted his part in the illegal trading between 2000 and 2008 in a number of different London Stock Exchange and AIM-listed shares.

He was jailed for two years and ordered to pay £640,000 in confiscation at a hearing last year.

Tracey McDermott, director of enforcement and financial crime at FSA, said: "Insider dealers are motivated by greed and a belief that they can make easy money at the expense of others.

"As a result of their actions the Littlewoods have not only received custodial sentences and seen their reputations and future careers destroyed they have also paid a sum in confiscation significantly greater than the profit from the indicted trading alone.

"The orders made today, coupled with the sentences previously imposed, should make it clear that insider dealing does not pay."

If the sums are not paid within six months, the Littlewoods will be liable to serve an extra three years in prison.

The couple have also been banned from carrying out any function in relation to any regulated activity under the Financial Services and Markets Act.

PA