HispanicBusiness

The U.S. government has accused Rajat K. Gupta of leaking sales forecasts for Procter & Gamble in late 2008.

U.S. prosecutors have filed a new insider trading claim against Rajat K. Gupta, the former director of Goldman Sachs and Procter & Gamble who is accused of leaking secret corporate information to the hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnam.

In a letter filed with the court, the government accused Mr. Gupta of leaking to Mr. Rajaratnam sales forecasts for Procter & Gamble in late 2008.

Mr. Gupta told Mr. Rajaratnam about "P.&G.'s organic sales growth forecast for the October-to-December quarter prior to P.&G.'s public announcement on or about Dec. 11, 2008," said the letter, which was made public on Monday.

Last October, prosecutors charged Mr. Gupta, the former global head of the consulting firm McKinsey, with leaking to Mr. Rajaratnam boardroom secrets about Goldman and Procter & Gamble.

Mr. Gupta, 63, is the most prominent business executive ensnared by the U.S. Justice Department's sweeping crackdown to root out insider trading on Wall Street and in corporate America.

With Monday's charge, the government has now accused Mr. Gupta of providing Mr. Rajaratnam with five separate illegal tips, including word about Warren E. Buffett's $5 billion investment in Goldman during the financial crisis.

In another count, prosecutors say that Mr. Gupta took part in 2007 in a Goldman board call from the offices of the Galleon Group, the hedge fund run by Mr. Rajaratnam. Mr. Gupta learned that Goldman's earnings, set for release the next morning, were going to be strong, the government contends. About 25 minutes after the board call, trading records show that Galleon bought at least $70 million worth of Goldman shares, allowing the fund to profit when the bank's stock rose the next day.

Gary P. Naftalis, a lawyer for Mr. Gupta, has said his client is innocent of all charges and has called the government's charges "totally baseless."

Mr. Gupta's trial is set for May 21.

Mr. Rajaratnam, who was convicted by a jury last May of orchestrating a huge insider trading ring, is serving an 11-year prison term.

In a letter to Judge Jed S. Rakoff of U.S. District Court in New York, the government said that the new accusation involving Procter & Gamble was based in part on instant messages and e-mails that prosecutors reviewed last week as part of the pretrial discovery process.

Unlike the case against Mr. Rajaratnam, in which the government had dozens of secretly recorded telephone conversations between the hedge fund manager and his accomplices, in the case against Mr. Gupta, the government has no direct evidence that shows him engaging in insider trading. Instead, the government plans to build a case based on circumstantial evidence -- like phone bills and trading records -- to establish Mr. Gupta's guilt.