NEW YORK, Feb 5: A former Credit Suisse investment banker from Pakistan was convicted on Monday of leaking confidential information about a string of corporate takeovers, including the TXU buyout as part of a $7.5 million insider trading scheme, to an investment banker in Pakistan.

After three days of deliberations, the jury at a Federal Court in Manhattan found Hafiz Mohammad Zubair Naseem guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and 28 counts of insider trading for relaying insider information to Aijaz Rahim, a former head of investment banking group at a bank in Pakistan and once Naseem’s boss.

He was taken into custody after prosecutors argued to the judge that Naseem was a flight risk and should be jailed ahead of sentencing.

The crimes carry a penalty of at least 25 years in prison and deportation. His lawyers expect him to serve about half that term in jail. The judge set the sentencing for April 7.

“We respectfully disagree with the jury’s verdict,” Michael F. Bachner, a lawyer for Naseem said. Naseem would file an appeal.

Naseem had come to the US in 2002 to earn a business degree at the New York University. He worked briefly at JP Morgan Chase before moving to Credit Suisse’s energy group in March 2006.

Prosecutors told the court that Naseem used his position as a banker almost immediately to feed information about deals to Rahim, who traded on the tips before the mergers were announced. They offered as evidence scores of phone calls Naseem had made and email messages he had sent from his office, including one message that read: “Let the fun begin.”

“It was perfect timing nearly all the time,” Assistant US Attorney Reed Brodsky said during closing arguments last Wednesday. “Nine out of nine times Rahim hit the lottery with the defendant’s help.”

The transactions included Express Scripts Inc’s failed bid for Caremark RX Inc and the buyout of TXU by a group led by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co and TPG Inc Caremark was eventually sold to CVS Corp.

Prosecutors alleged that Naseem accessed internal computer files at Credit Suisse about pending mergers on which he wasn’t working and rifled through the papers on colleagues’ desks in search of information. “The defendant wasn’t just a curious young investment banker,” Brodsky said. “He was searching for insider information to tip Rahim.”