The Department of Justice (DOJ) said it had charged John Harold Rogers, a 63-year-old US national, with spying for Beijing while employed as a senior advisor at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors (FRB) Division of International Finance between 2010 and 2021.
The indictment, unsealed Friday, said Rogers had leaked secret information from the Fed's board and its powerful rate-setting committee.
"The confidential information that Rogers allegedly shared with his Chinese co-conspirators, who worked for the intelligence and security apparatus of China and who posed as graduate students at a PRC university, is economically valuable when secret," the DOJ said in a statement.
The DOJ said that, since 2018, Rogers had "allegedly exploited his employment with the FRB by soliciting trade-secret information regarding proprietary economic data sets," including deliberations on tariffs against China.
"He passed that information electronically to his personal email account, in violation of FRB policy, or printed it prior to traveling to China, in preparation for meetings with his co-conspirators," they added.
When in China, Rogers then shared the information during secret meetings held in hotel rooms, while he pretended to teach classes at the University of Shandong.
He was paid approximately $450,000 for part-time work as a professor at "a Chinese university," the indictment alleges.
Alongside this remuneration, the DOJ alleges co-conspirators of Rogers also provided him with gifts, paid for his airfare to China and his lodging and dining while he was there, and even offered "to arrange and pay for a beach vacation."
When confronted by FRB inspectors in 2020, "Rogers lied about his accessing and passage of sensitive information and his associations with his co-conspirators," the DOJ said.
The charges of conspiracy to commit economic espionage and making false statements carry maximum penalties of 15 years in prison and a $5 million fine, and five years in prison respectively, the DOJ said.
"The Chinese Communist Party has expanded its economic espionage campaign to target U.S. government financial policies and trade secrets in an effort to undermine the U.S. and become the sole superpower," FBI assistant director in charge David Sundberg said in a statement.
"Today's indictment represents the FBI's unwavering commitment to protect U.S. national security interests and U.S. jobs and to bring to justice those who are willing to betray their country for personal gain," he added.
The DOJ said the data Rogers shared could allow China to manipulate US markets.
"Gaining advance knowledge of U.S. economic policy, including advance knowledge of changes to the federal funds rate, could provide China with an advantage when selling or buying U.S. bonds or securities," it said.
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