Yuji Naka, one of the co-creators of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, has just been arrested by the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors' Special Investigation Division. Try and say that three times fast, eh? Anyways, according to Fuji News Network, Naka's been arrested for insider trading. Allegedly, back in January 2020 while working at Square Enix, he discovered the existence of Dragon Quest Tact, which Square Enix and Aiming were jointly developing together. He then apparently went out and bought 10,000 shares of Aiming for around 2.8 million yen, which translates to approximately $20k US dollars.
Given how popular Dragon Quest is over in Japan, with Dragon Quest Tact racking up 10 million downloads there, it makes sense that Naka thought that the stock price of Aiming would rise upon the announcement of Dragon Quest Tact. He apparently wasn't alone in this thinking either.
Two other men, former Square Enix employee Taisuke Sazaki and acquaintance Fumiaki Suzuki, were also arrested on suspicion of insider trading. They apparently went all-in compared to Naka, spending 47.72 million yen (about $340k) on 162,000 shares of Aiming. Perhaps all three men could've employed some more tact, but I digress.
It is currently unknown if the three men sold their shares or not, but assuming that all of this is true to begin with, you'd assume that would be the case. After all, if you're dead set on becoming a white-collar criminal and risking everything over something like this, you might as well try and make a profit before it all potentially comes crashing down. Otherwise, what's the point?
Anyways, if you want to see a more potentially explosive article on unlikely crimes against Japanese game developers, check out our article on a Konami bomb threat. Spoiler alert: there weren't any bombs, thankfully, but it is still quite interesting.
Thanks, Fuji News Network.
For more information on whatever will happen to Yuji Naka, stay tuned to TechRaptor.
