TOKYO Kyodo Tokyo prosecutors served fresh arrest warrants Wednesday against two former employees of the major gaming firm Square Enix Co. over a second case of alleged insider trading.
One of the two is Yuji Naka, who is known as the creator of the Sonic the Hedgehog video game series, when he previously worked for Sega Corp., another gaming company in Tokyo.
Naka and the second suspect, Taisuke Sazaki, are alleged to have bought shares in Ateam Inc. ahead of a February 2021 announcement that the Nagoya-based game developer will create a mobile game with Square Enix for its popular Final Fantasy series.
The prosecutors believe that the two men sold the stock for a hefty profit.
Naka, 57, allegedly bought around 120,000 shares in Ateam for 144.7 million yen $1 million between late January and early February 2021.
Sazaki, 39, is suspected of having purchased about 91,000 shares in the company for around 105 million yen from late September 2020 to late February 2021.
He is said to have leaked the information to an acquaintance and helped that individual purchase about 10,000 shares for some 11.8 million yen.
In late September 2020, the shares of Ateam traded at around 800 yen. After the company announced the deal with Square Enix, the stock price of Ateam went up to around 1,800 yen.
In a related move, the prosecutors indicted the two men and Fumiaki Suzuki, 40, a company employee who is a friend of Sazaki, on Wednesday for insider trading over the development of the mobile game Dragon Quest Tact.
In November of this year, Naka, Sazaki and Suzuki were arrested.
The Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission filed a complaint with Tokyo prosecutors on Tuesday.