Neil Collins quits Thomson Reuters over share deals

Thomson Reuters has been rocked by the resignation of one of its best-known commentators after he was found to have dealt in shares shortly after writing about them.

Collins, who worked for Reuters Breakingviews, quit, said the company, after "multiple breaches of the Thomson Reuters code of conduct on share dealing". Other journalists on the Breakingviews service are being investigated, although it is not known whether they, too, have broken their employer's rules.

The ex-City editor of the Daily Telegraph and formerly an Evening Standard columnist, Collins managed his family shareholdings.

He wrote a column for Breakingviews about BP and, soon afterwards, purchased shares in the oil giant. He did not conceal what he was doing. It was raised that he may have been in breach of Reuters' regulations requiring journalists to declare to their manager that they hold shares in a company they're writing about and not to deal in shares within 30 days of writing about them.

When Collins reviewed his dealings he discovered he'd sold shares in Marks & Spencer five days after commenting on M&S's results.

Collins is not thought to have profited from the trades. Thomson Reuters has written to the FSA informing them of the case. It could not come at a worse time in relations between the watchdog and the media. Only last week, newspaper editors wrote to the FSA complaining about its clampdown on companies supplying news to journalists.