{"id":299174,"date":"2021-07-15T00:05:54","date_gmt":"2021-07-14T21:05:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/texas-rep-pat-fallon-dumped-microsoft-stock-before-pentagon-nixed-10b-contract\/"},"modified":"2021-07-15T00:05:54","modified_gmt":"2021-07-14T21:05:54","slug":"texas-rep-pat-fallon-dumped-microsoft-stock-before-pentagon-nixed-10b-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/texas-rep-pat-fallon-dumped-microsoft-stock-before-pentagon-nixed-10b-contract\/","title":{"rendered":"#Texas Rep. Pat Fallon dumped Microsoft stock before Pentagon nixed $10B contract"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Texas Rep. Pat Fallon dumped Microsoft stock before Pentagon nixed $10B contract<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n

A congressman who supervises the Defense Department\u2019s tech spending dumped up to $250,000 <\/strong>worth of Microsoft stock two weeks before the Pentagon revealed it was canceling a $10 billion contract with the software giant, according to public documents.<\/p>\n

US Rep. Pat Fallon, a Texas Republican who sits on a key subcommittee overseeing the Department of Defense\u2019s technology<\/a> policy, sold between $100,000 and $250,000 of Microsoft shares on June 21, government disclosures show<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Two weeks later, the Pentagon made the surprise announcement that it would cancel a $10 billion cloud computing contract \u2014 called JEDI, or Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure \u2014 that it had awarded to Microsoft in 2019 after the company fought a bidding war and legal battle against Amazon.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Fallon, who was elected last year to represent a northeastern district of the Lone Star State, is a member of the House\u2019s Subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems.\u00a0According to the subcommittee\u2019s site<\/a>, Fallon and his colleagues have \u201cjurisdiction over\u00a0Department of Defense policy related to the acquisition of computer software.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"The
The Pentagon said on July 6 that it was canceling a $10 billion contract with Microsoft for cloud computing.<\/figcaption>
CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Imag<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If members of Congress or their families trade stocks based on nonpublic information, they can be prosecuted under the STOCK Act passed in 2012.<\/p>\n

In an audio recording that Fallon\u2019s press secretary Luke Ball sent to The Post, the congressman said the trades were actually part of a bet that Microsoft stock would go up. On May 26, he said he bought 1,000 shares of Microsoft stock at $250.91. He said he then sold an option called a \u201ccovered call\u201d to another investor and was paid $5,041 in return. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe option was called about three to four weeks later and at that moment I no longer owned \u2014 the other people made the money from the stock rising \u2014 I no longer owned Microsoft stock,\u201d Fallon said.<\/p>\n

Fallon added that if he were aware of the Pentagon\u2019s intention to cancel the JEDI deal, he would have bet on Microsoft stock falling rather than rising. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had prior knowledge why would I have bought stock and only optioned it upward and only bet on an upward trend?\u201d Fallon said. \u201cI would\u2019ve done the reverse, so it\u2019s provably false.\u201d<\/p>\n

Columbia Law professor and securities law expert Joshua Mitts told The Post that the $5,041 payment Fallon received in exchange for the covered call may have been intended to help cover his losses if Microsoft stock fell.<\/p>\n

\"Rep.
Rep. Pat Fallon said his trades were actually part of a bet that Microsoft stock would go up.<\/figcaption>
CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Imag<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cIt sounds consistent with someone who thinks the stock price will potentially fall in the future,\u201d Mitts said. \u201cThat would be consistent potentially with someone who had negative information.\u201d<\/p>\n

Craig Holman, a governmental ethics lobbyist at progressive group Public Citizen, said it was likely that Fallon\u2019s membership of the subcommittee meant he knew the Pentagon planned to cancel the Microsoft contract when he sold his shares.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe decision to cancel the Microsoft contract did not happ<\/a>en overnight \u2014 that\u2019s something the Department of Defense would be considering for weeks and weeks,\u201d he added. \u201cIt certainly is reasonable to suspect that the Department of Defense would have informed this committee of their impending decision.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has every appearance the Congressman had access to non-public information and cashed in on it,\u201d he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Microsoft
Texas GOP Rep. Pat Fallon sold between $100,000 and $250,000 of Microsoft shares on June 21, two weeks before the Pentagon announced it was canceling a $10 billion contract with the company. <\/figcaption>
SOPA Images\/LightRocket via Gett<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In a statement, Fallon\u2019s spokesman Ball countered, \u201cAny accusation that Congressman Fallon acted inappropriately with his routine stock transactions is wildly speculative and has no foundation in truth. We challenge anyone to bring one shred of actual evidence to back up this ridiculous accusation.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not the first time that Fallon, sworn in just six months ago, has landed in hot water over his stock trades. In June, Insider reported<\/a> that Fallon potentially violated federal ethics laws by failing to disclose up to $17 million in stock trades within 30 days of making them. \u00a0<\/p>\n

At the time, a spokesperson for Fallon claimed the congressman was \u201cunfamiliar with how frequently members of Congress are required to file financial disclosures.\u201d\u00a0Fallon would comply with disclosure rules in the future, the rep added.<\/p>\n

Other US lawmakers who have caught scrutiny over stock trades include House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) \u2014 whose husband frequently trades big tech shares \u2014 and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who pushed legislation to boost the nation\u2019s semiconductor industry while his wife bought stock in companies that stood to benefit.\u00a0<\/p>\n

To prevent potential conflicts of interest, Holman said all members of Congress and their immedia<\/a>te families should be banned from trading individual stocks. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Texas
\u201cIt has every appearance the Congressman had access to non-public information and cashed in on it,\u201d said Public Citizen\u2019s Craig Holman. <\/figcaption>
CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Imag<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThis is a classic example of why members of Congress should not be actively trading in the stock market while they sit in office, especially in stocks of businesses that they oversee in their subcommittee positions,\u201d Holman said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While Fallon\u2019s sale of Microsoft stock may raise ethical questions, it did not appear to save him much money. Microsoft stock fell about 0.4 percent on news<\/a> of the JEDI contract being cancelled and has since rebounded. <\/p>\n

On the day Fallon sold his Microsoft shares, the stock was trading at $262.63. It has since risen nearly 8 percent to $282.95, according to MarketWatch data<\/a>.\n <\/div>\n

If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\n

For forums sites go to Forum.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

If you want to read more News articles, you can visit our News category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#Texas Rep. Pat Fallon dumped Microsoft stock before Pentagon nixed $10B contract” A congressman who supervises the Defense Department\u2019s tech spending dumped up to $250,000 worth of Microsoft stock two weeks before the Pentagon revealed it was canceling a $10 billion contract with the software giant, according to public documents. US Rep. Pat Fallon, a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":299175,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/07\/pat-fallon-99-1.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[111819,52214,80881,89888,70286,6474,78432],"class_list":["post-299174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-7-14-21","tag-congress","tag-department-of-defense","tag-insider-trading","tag-microsoft","tag-texas","tag-the-pentagon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299174\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/299175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}