> There are disagreements as to whether or not this practice is illegal.If I (unrelated to Steve Ballmer) tell you "hey, that guys getting old, he'll probably retire soon", that's not insider trading.
Near as I can tell, the Reuters early release is firmly within the category of the latter. I can't see any reason why early release of private research would be illegal.
If not I suspect its illegal.
Al Capone was done for tax evasion, cannot see why Reuters cannot be in breach of a Fair Trading / Sales Act :-)
If they were releasing it at other times it would most likely be a contract breach or some other civil matter.
But that is a big if. All this article points to to prove that is a disgruntled employee and a Nanex study (all months old) that do not have any proof of early release.
If the regular customers know that there are other more privileged tiers that impact the value of what they're buying, I guess it's ok. Otherwise, i think it might qualify as fraud
If the 4th secret tier exists, that would be a bigger problem but there is no proof of that in the article. It is all speculation.
The Michigan Survey is one (probably the most prominent) of a number of private surveys and data point the big banks, but also include things like National Association of Purchasing Managers Survey, LA Port Traffic, Mortgage Banking Association Mortgage Applications, American Institute of Architecture Billing Index (leading indicator of construction), and a host of others.