Former Goldman employee's stepbrother avoids jail for insider trading

The stepbrother of a former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. associate was sentenced to a year of probation for trading on inside tips taken from the investment bank and from Blackstone Inc. 

Christopher Salamone avoided prison because of his cooperation with prosecutors, including secretly recording his stepbrother, Anthony Viggiano. Salamone, who was sentenced Tuesday by Judge Katherine Polk Failla in Manhattan federal court, also was ordered to forfeit $307,339.

Salamone, 37, called the crime “the worst mistake of my life.” In a court filing, his lawyer told the judge he was suffering “severe familial consequences” for cooperating against his stepbrother.

Viggiano pleaded guilty in January to a single count of securities fraud, admitting that he passed secret information on at least seven transactions that he learned about while working at the two Wall Street firms. He was sentenced last month to 28 months behind bars. 

The tips led to more than $400,000 in illegal profits for Salamone and Stephen Forlano, a college pal of Viggiano. Forlano, who also pleaded guilty, was sentenced in May to 13 months in prison. Viggiano, who was nicknamed “Rigatoni,” didn’t trade on the information himself, but accepted a bag containing $35,000 in cash in exchange for the tips. 

“You have both the people here who executed trades. What you’re missing is the f[***]ing dots. Right?” Viggiano said in a June 2023 conversation that was recorded by Salamone. “They have me” at Goldman Sachs “having access to this information.”

“It doesn’t take a brain surgeon,” Viggiano said on the recording.

A fourth man, who was not charged criminally, settled civil claims by the US Securities and Exchange Commission that he traded on tips passed to him by Forlano. 

The case is US v. Salamone, 23-cr-00496, US District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).