Ex-Israel swimming star Dov Malnik, pleads guilty to insider trading in U.S.

The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York said Sunday that former Israeli swimming star Dov Malnik has pleaded guilty to offenses relating to securities fraud and insider trading.

Malnik, 43, and his Israeli business partner Tomer Feingold, 42, have both been charged with numerous offenses relating to their roles as securities traders in a wide-ranging international insider trading ring between 2013 and 2017, which allegedly made them both millions of dollars in illicit profits by trading based on inside information.

Malnik represented Israel in the world swimming championship in Japan in 2001 and in Spain in 2003, and even held the Israeli record in breaststroke.

According to the indictments, the two tried to disguise their criminal activities through the use of encrypted messages as well as burner phones. In addition, the two allegedly used straw companies and bank accounts in countries considered tax havens.

Malnik, a citizen of Israel and Lithuania, pleaded guilty to one count of securities fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. He was arrested in Switzerland on October 7, 2020, and was later extradited to the U.S..

Feingold, who is also an Israeli citizen, was a competitive swimmer who represented Texas College in the U.S. College Championships in the early 2000 and reportedly currently lives in Italy.

He has not yet been extradited to the United States, where he has been charged with several counts of fraud, trafficking in inside information and money laundering - all of which he denies.

According to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that filed the indictment, the two men were named in January trial testimony by Marc Demane Debih, a former Geneva investor who admitted to earning more than $ 70 million for his role in the insider-trading network.

According to the SEC, Debih received the information, which he passed on to Feingold and Melnick, from a man named Benjamin Taylor, 36, a former banker at Moelis & Co, and Darina Windsor, 32, who previously worked at Centerview Partners.

The investigation also convicted an American investment banker named Brian Cohen, who admitted to trading inside information in January 2020, as well as a manager at a pharmaceutical company who was also convicted of the same offense.