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Former exec at drugmaker Ipsen sentenced to prison for insider trading
Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on January 30, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 26, 2026
Global Banking and Finance Review
Company
Published by Global Banking and Finance Review
Posted on January 30, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 26, 2026
Former Ipsen executive Dishant Gupta sentenced to two months for insider trading related to Epizyme acquisition, profiting over $260,000.
By Nate Raymond
BOSTON (Reuters) - A former executive at French drugmaker Ipsen was sentenced on Thursday to two months in prison for illegally trading on inside information he learned about his company's plans to acquire cancer drug developer Epizyme in 2022.
Dishant Gupta, Ipsen's former director of data strategy and operations, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Julia Kobick in Boston after pleading guilty in October to engaging in securities fraud in order to earn more than $260,000 through insider trading.
Prosecutors had asked the judge to sentence Gupta to one year in prison, while defense lawyers had pushed for a non-custodial sentence. Gupta must also pay a $20,000 fine and forfeit the $260,000, prosecutors said.
His lawyer did not respond to a request for comment.
Prosecutors said that during a meeting in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in March 2022, an Ipsen executive asked Gupta to help him put together materials related to a potential acquisition of a cancer drug and an unidentified drug company's assets.
Days later, Gupta met with Ipsen executives to discuss possible acquisitions in the oncology market, prosecutors said. By April 7, 2022, Gupta knew the cancer drug and assets Ipsen wanted to acquire belonged to Cambridge-based biotech Epizyme, the maker of the cancer medication Tazverik, prosecutors said.
That day, he began buying Epizyme shares in his wife's brokerage account, according to court documents. Prosecutors said he bought more in the days that followed as the companies discussed a potential outright acquisition of Epizyme.
Ipsen announced its $247 million acquisition of Epizyme on June 27, 2022. Gupta then sold all of his Epizyme shares, netting him a profit of more than $262,000, prosecutors said.
"The defendant's crime is a form of corruption," prosecutors wrote in court papers ahead of Thursday's sentencing. "He took advantage of the trust that his employer, and co-workers, placed in him to try and make money."
(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Marguerita Choy)
Dishant Gupta was sentenced to two months in prison for insider trading related to his knowledge of Ipsen's acquisition plans.
In addition to his prison sentence, Gupta was ordered to pay a $20,000 fine and forfeit $260,000 in profits from his illegal trading.
Gupta engaged in insider trading after learning about Ipsen's plans to acquire a cancer drug, which he acted upon by purchasing shares of Epizyme.
Gupta began buying Epizyme shares on April 7, 2022, shortly after he learned about the potential acquisition.
Ipsen announced its $247 million acquisition of Epizyme on June 27, 2022, after which Gupta sold his shares for a profit.
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