RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s financial regulatory authority said it has referred five suspects to the Public Prosecution accused of engaging in “manipulative and misleading” practices, a statement on state-run Saudi Press Agency said. The Capital Market Authority of Saudi Arabia said the suspects violated Article 49 of the Capital Market Law, and Articles 2 and 8 of the Market Conduct Regulations. It said the suspects “engaged in manipulative and misleading practices in market trading by entering buy or sell orders of shares with the aim of influencing the price of the banknote.” It added that they “traded (bought) the shares of a number of listed companies, then promoted opinions on social networking platforms (such as) Twitter and a forum with the aim of influencing the price of the banknote.” “Then they traded (sold) the shares of the listed companies that were affected by the opinions they had promoted about them.” The statement said it had detected similar suspicious practices between Jan. 20 and Oct. 1 last year that had affected the prices of shares of 37 companies listed in the Saudi stock exchange.