Wild Trading in Metals Puts Fund Manager in Cross Hairs

By SUSAN PULLIAM
WSJ

Christopher Pia was the quintessential hedge-fund success story: a hard-charger from a working-class New York City neighborhood whose trading prowess earned him a top job at fund giant Moore Capital Management. He bought a sprawling house in Armonk, N.Y., and tooled around town in an orange Lamborghini.

But his 18-year relationship with Moore Capital and its founder, hedge-fund tycoon Louis Bacon, came to an abrupt end in late 2008. Mr. Bacon forced out his onetime head trader, friend and protégé, and Mr. Pia launched his own fund.

The story behind the rupture is only now surfacing, and it involves allegations of a kind of improper trading that regulators worry is becoming more widespread. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission is investigating whether Mr. Pia's trading at Moore involved market manipulation, according to a person close to the situation. Specifically, CFTC investigators are looking into whether Mr. Pia improperly tried to push up prices of platinum and palladium, possibly to boost Moore's returns and his own compensation, this person says.