Los Angeles, May 27 (DPA) Federal authorities Wednesday arrested a secretary at the Disney Company and her boyfriend on suspicion of insider trading violations after they tried to sell confidential information about the company's earnings to hedge fund traders.

Bonnie Hoxie, 33, was the assistant to Zenia Mucha, Disney's head of corporate communications. Hoxie was charged with her boyfriend, Yonni Sebag, 28, of sending letters to at least 33 investment companies offering to sell them confidential information.

"Hoxie and Sebbag stole Disney's confidential pre-release earnings information and put it up for sale," said Robert Khuzami, an official with the Securities Exchange Commission. "Fortunately, multiple hedge funds reported the illicit scheme, and the SEC and criminal law enforcement authorities acted quickly to stop this brazen attempt to establish an ongoing insider-trading business".

Prosecutors said that the two handed over confidential information to two undercover FBI agents and received from them a $15,000 cash payment.

The statement said that none of the companies contacted had acted on the information and that Disney was fully cooperating with the investigation.