RE: , Joseph Kennedy Sr who made vast fortune in various shady activities including stock market manipulation, insider trading, and other questionable practices.
Was there a law against insider trading back then?
No...the stock market was largely unregulated back then. Many of Kennedys activities were perfectly legal, though obviously manipulative. A favorite Kennedy trick: He would take an inactive stock, trade it back and forth with his friends, creating a false sense of activity among the public at large. After the stock was pumped up, Kennedy and his friends would unload their shares at high prices on to the unsuspecting public-—a classic pump and dump scheme. Kennedy even joked to a colleague, we need to make as much money as possible before they pass a law against it. To add to the irony, FDR appointed Kennedy Sr to be the first head of the SEC——saying it takes a thief to catch a theif and that Kennedy was familiar with all of the tricks of the trade.