Washington, D.C. — The Commodity Futures Trading Commission today filed an amended complaint alleging that Peter Miller and Omerta Capital LLC engaged in an additional fraudulent scheme involving tipped confidential block trade order information and made false statements to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), a board of trade and designated contract market. 

The CFTC filed its original complaint against Miller and Omerta on December 10, 2021, charging them with receiving tipped confidential block trade order information belonging to an energy company, then trading natural gas futures on the basis of this information, including entering into non-arm’s length, fictitious block trades in violation of the Commodity Exchange Act and CFTC Regulations.  [See CFTC Press Release 8468-21.]

In the amended complaint, the CFTC alleges that Miller and Omerta engaged in an additional fraudulent scheme nearly identical to that alleged in the original complaint. In this additional fraudulent scheme, Miller and Omerta received tipped confidential block trade order information belonging to a different energy company, then traded natural gas futures on the basis of this information and similarly entered into non-arm’s length, fictitious block trades. The amended complaint alleges that Miller generated over $3.5 million in trading profits in this additional fraudulent scheme.

The amended complaint also charges Miller and Omerta with making false statements to CME. In a 2017 interview related to the fraudulent schemes alleged in the original and amended complaints, CME asked Miller whether he “pre-hedged” trades (i.e., made offsetting trades after receiving block trade order information, but before consummating the block trade) in violation of CME rules. Miller told CME he never pre-hedged. According to the amended complaint, this statement was false because many times throughout the fraudulent schemes, Miller executed trades onscreen on behalf of Omerta after receiving block trade order information, but before consummating the block trades. 

Division of Enforcement staff members responsible for this case are Alison Auxter, Clemon Ashley, Lauren Fulks, Brandon Wozniak, Thomas Simek, Christopher Reed, and Charles Marvine.