Friday, 14 September 2001 19:26 (ET)

Authorities probe bin Laden profiteering

WASHINGTON, Sept 14 (UPI) -- U.S. and British intelligence agencies are investigating links between alleged terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and various stock trades in the United States and Europe around the time of Tuesday's devastating attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, which sent foreign markets into tailspins over worries about the U.S. economy, according to the Sankei Shimbun newspaper in Japan.

Among other things, under a practice know as short selling, a person with prior information can score large profits when a stock sinks in value on certain news -- such as corporate problems, or in this case, the more broader news of an attack which has worked to economically hobble the United States.

The attacks halted trading on the U.S. markets before the opening bell, but authorities are looking into trades before the official opening of stock futures.

There are also unconfirmed reports of Japanese authorities looking into similar securities transactions

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission declined to "confirm or deny" any such investigations by U.S. financial authorities, but a spokesman added that the agency has received a variety of investor e-mail "suggesting that the SEC check records" on stock transactions around the time of the attacks to establish any possible linkage to profiteering by persons related to the terrorists.

-- Anonymous, September 14, 2001