A high profile insider trading case has come to an end in Australia.
A former trader with Macquarie Group has been sent to prison for two and a half years over a series of offshore stock market trades that made him $A1.4 million in four months.
Oswyn de Silva, 37, of Malayasia, worked for Macquarie in Sydney and London.
Radio New Zealand's Sydney correspondent says he pleaded guilty to a form of insider trading called 'front-running' - where a trader uses his knowledge of upcoming official bank trades in securities and derivatives to make money on his own account.
During an earlier court hearing, de Silva defended his behaviour by saying he viewed his trading as a kind of performance fee to compensate for the inhuman hours he worked.
