SECP files four criminal cases for stock price manipulation-all against this one man. What exactly did he do and how?

There is supposedly a big bad wolf stalking the Pakistan Stock Exchange. Earlier this month the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), the regulating agency responsible for rounding up all said wolves big and small, filed four different criminal cases. 

Within the stock market this was big news. The last time the SECP took criminal action against anyone was back in 2017. The only problem is that the SECP has been suspiciously cryptic in its announcement.

In its press release, the commission stated that four different cases have been filed against different individuals which include brokers, as well as sponsor shareholders of listed companies . The violations had been carried out between 2019 to 2021 and the central accusation is stock price manipulation. What the press statement doesn’t tell us is who these individuals are and which stocks they manipulated. 

Who could they be? Suspicion might be pointed towards those in the stock market that have the biggest, scariest teeth and the sharpest longest claws. These are the Jehangir Siddiquis, the Aqeel Karim Dhedhis, and the Munaf Ibrahims that loom large in the world of Pakistani stocks. But it isn’t one of the big boys from Karachi that have come under the regulator’s scrutinous gaze. In fact, it is a little known broker from Lahore that has woken the SECP out of their slumber after seven years. 

Of course, it is just a little unfair to refer to Ali Malik as a little known broker. Profit has access to copies of the criminal cases that the SECP has taken to Banking Court. The chief accused is Ali Malik of the Lahore based brokerage company First National Equities Limited (FNEL). While FNEL and Ali Malik might not be household names, within the small community of stock market brokers they carry some heft. The man has been around since the 1980s and has made a name for himself in the stock market. But it isn’t just Ali Malik that has been nominated in these cases. In fact, his entire family has been accused of allegedly being part of a blatant stock manipulation campaign from 2019-21. 

The shares in question that have supposedly been manipulated belong to different companies. There is first the Treet Corporation, which is one of the larger listed companies on the PSX and has been incorporated since 1977.