Former AMD CEO linked to trading fraud

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Hector Ruiz, former CEO of Austin based Advanced Micro Devices , is linked to an insider trading scheme by the Wall Street Journal .

Ruiz is the formerly unnamed AMD executive mentioned in a criminal case filed in the U.S. Attorney's office in Manhattan earlier this month according to a report in the online edition of the Wall Street Journal Tuesday evening.

Ruiz allegedly leaked information about the company in 2008 to a hedge fund group named New Castle.

New Castle is among hedge funds accused by federal authorities of participating in insider trading that points back to the New York based hedge fund Galleon Group.

Galleon is at the center of the biggest insider trading case in decates.  Six employees, including Galleon's co-founder are accused of illegally trading on nonpublic information in a scheme that brought in $20 million.

Ruiz became the chief executive at AMD in 2002 and resigned last July.  Ruiz is now chairman of Globalfoundries, an AMD spinoff company.

AMD issued the following statement to KXAN.

"We are thoroughly reviewing the situation, but at this time we don’t have any more detail to discuss publicly. We are not aware of any allegation of criminal misconduct on the part of any current or former AMD employees, nor have any current or former AMD employees been charged with a crime. It would be inappropriate to comment further on an ongoing Department of Justice investigation."