What is market abuse?

Market abuse is an umbrella term used for situations where traders and investors have an unfair advantage over others. There's two key areas of market abuse: insider trading and market manipulation.

Where have you heard about market abuse?

You've probably heard of insider trading, the practice of trading securities  when you have access to non-public information about the company - putting you at a major advantage. It's probably the most well-known form of market abuse.

What you need to know about market abuse.

Second to insider trading, market manipulation is the other main area of market abuse. Market manipulation is where a person deceives others by intentionally giving out false or misleading information for personal gain - often to influence the price of a share.

Market manipulation comes in various forms. Pooling is a common example - where an investor trades on behalf of a group and shares the profits. Stock bashing is a more obvious manipulative technique. That's when you post false or misleading information about a company to try and drive down stock prices.

Find out more about market abuse.

Read our guides to insider trading  and market manipulation  to learn more about market abuse.