BILLINGS – Montana’s Congressman, Denny Rehberg, today released the following statement after President Obama signed the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act into law.  The final version of the bill passed the U.S. House on February 9, 2012 and the Senate more than a month later on March 22.  Rehberg is a co-sponsor of the bill in the House.

“Public service should never be about personal gain, so I’m glad Congress was able to work together to send this bill to the President for his signature.  This just goes to show what we can accomplish by working together, and I hope we can expand this spirit of cooperation to the bigger issues facing our country like job creation, energy prices and reining in government spending.”

Last year, a Wall Street Journal investigation revealed 72 instances of potential insider trading among Congressional aides on both sides of the aisle.  This sort of insider trading is illegal on Wall Street and in private business, but there was no regulation to prevent Congressional Representatives or their staff from leveraging the privileged information access they enjoy for personal gain.  The STOCK Act corrects this oversight, prohibiting Members of Congress and their staff and Executive Branch employees from benefiting from insider information.