José Elías denies having leaked privileged information to Piqué and points to a former Audax director

Businessman José Elías has denied having provided privileged information to Gerard Piqué about Atrys Health’s takeover bid for Aspy Global Services and has directly pointed to a former executive of his business group as a possible origin of the accusations that have led to the sanction imposed by the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV). Elías has spoken publicly about the case on his YouTube channel, in which he has a podcast dedicated to content on business, investment and entrepreneurship, days after it emerged that the CNMV had fined the businessman 100,000 euros and the former FC Barcelona soccer player 200,000 euros for operations related to Aspy shares before the announcement of the takeover with insider information that was not yet public. The CNMV has fined him after concluding, after a file, that it informed Piqué that Atrys Health was in talks to launch a takeover bid for Aspy Global Services. Upon learning this information, the former soccer player acquired 104,166 Aspy shares, disbursing about 240,000 euros. Two days later, the operation was officially announced to the market and the shares rose on the stock market. Just one week later, Piqué sold those shares with a 22% appreciation and a profit of around 50,000 euros. Elías acknowledges that he met Gerard Piqué at a business lunch that took place in a restaurant in Barcelona. But he denies having spoken about the operation with the former footballer. «I met Gerard Piqué that day. We were not alone. I was there, there was Gerard Piqué, there was a financial advisor and there was a manager from my company who was aware of the entire operation. He had exactly the same information as me,» he explains. The businessman gives more details about the conversations they had at lunch and links the origin of the file to that former manager, with whom he claims to currently have a bad relationship after his departure from the organization. «The context is that this person leaves my organization not in the best of ways and there is no cordial relationship with him at the moment. This person was the one who introduced me to Gerard Piqué. I did not have access to Piqué but he did because he was within the club’s body,» he says. Elías has insisted on several occasions that the meal was to talk about the businesses that the former soccer player was developing, and that they had the objective of exposing plans to participate as a potential investor. «I know perfectly well what happened in the conversation that day. I had a meal with Gerard Piqué, it was a time when he was in many businesses and was looking to raise capital because he was with the Kings League and they called me as a possible investor. I was talking to Gerard Piqué about those businesses, the topic of Aspy did not come up because I did not know that Gerard Piqué invested in the stock market,» he defends himself. Elías also questioned the CNMV’s reasoning, considering it proven that he was the one who transferred the confidential information. “I don’t know how they can come to the conclusion that it was me who said it because I wasn’t the only one at that table who had that information,” he said. He also criticized that the focus of the investigation had been focused exclusively on him. «Once the company launches the takeover bid, I don’t care if the stock goes up or down. I don’t care if Gerard buys or doesn’t buy, I don’t get any benefit from this. I don’t quite understand that they fine me and no one asks the other person who had the same information as me,» he expressed. Despite his criticism, the businessman stated that he will respect the decisions of the stock market supervisor, although he has also advanced that he will defend himself. “Now I am going to defend myself and, if in the end I have to pay because they consider me guilty, I will pay,” concludes Elías. Beyond the final outcome, the case has reopened the debate on the use of privileged information and the damage that stock market operations entail for retail investors when someone, due to the position they hold (advisors, lawyers, family members, journalists or anyone who has access to sensitive data) uses information reserved only for a few insiders to obtain an economic benefit for themselves or for third parties. Both Spanish legislation and European regulations consider this type of practice a serious infringement because it affects equal access to information and trust in financial markets.