WASHINGTON — The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed a complaint against Dichao Xie, a Chinese national, for his alleged participation in a fraudulent scheme in which he misused non-public information to trade on the feeder cattle futures market.

The complaint states that at least 71 times from about Dec. 2021 to April 2022, Xie improperly used the information to intentionally execute transactions on feeder cattle futures and options through his personal trading account.

At the time, he was working as a quantitative trader at a larger multinational corporation that was not named in the document. The transactions generated an approximate personal profit of $178,075. Additionally, Xie put up many transactions on his own behalf within seconds of entering the employer’s transaction that was described as “constituting fictitious and non-competitive trades.”

“When market participants steal non-public information to trade for their personal benefit, they defraud the sources of the information and gain an unfair advantage,” Ian P. McGinley, director of enforcement for the CFTC. “The CFTC is committed to maintaining the integrity of our commodities markets, and we will continue to focus on rooting out the unlawful misappropriation and misuse of confidential information.”

The case was filed in the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.