Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open.

Why is Insider Trading Illegal?
@sdg - If you can be flippant, I can be pedantic. Insider Trading is not illegal. Any employee of a company can be an insider, yet most of their trades are perfectly legal. What is illegal is trading on Inside Information. Such information may be available to those within a company, or those who have some contact with an employee. In fact, if I am seated at a restaurant table and hear Bill and Warren talking about a purchase they plan to make, I am in possession of inside information and risk prosecution should I purchase shares and profit.  Often, a company will have a "quiet period" before earnings reports or potential stock-price-moving-news. During this time, employees are forbidden from buying or selling shares, excluding those that would be automatically bought in their retirement accounts or ESPP.