The US Attorney for Northern California has indicted a Scottish man on charges that he illegally manipulated stock prices with a simple Twitter account.

According to the indictment (PDF), 62-year-old James Alan Craig created two fraudulent Twitter accounts on which he pretended to be market research firms. He then tweeted out false info about publicly traded stocks on Twitter, causing significant drops in stock prices for two companies. He then allegedly day-traded on those stocks through his girlfriend's TradeMonster account.

The first account was called @Mudd1Waters, an imitation of Muddy Waters Research. Prosecutors say Craig also grabbed that firm's logo and slapped it on his fake Twitter account. In a series of eight tweets published over the course of 90 minutes in January 2013, Craig falsely stated that Audience, a Bay Area sound technology company, was being investigated by the DOJ on fraud charges. Audience's stock dropped by 28 percent. The SEC halted trading, but not before Craig bought 300 shares and added another 100 the next day.

The following day, he allegedly used an account called @citreonresearc, again using a real logo to imitate another legitimate firm, Citron Research. In another short tweet-storm, he falsely said that the FDA had seized drug trial papers from Sarepta Therapeutics, a Massachusetts-based biopharmaceutical company. He also said the company's drug trials were tainted. Sarepta stock dropped 16 percent, and Craig allegedly bought the stock through his girlfriend's account as prices plummeted.

There wasn't a big payoff for Craig. A separately filed SEC complaint (PDF) notes that he earned only about $100 from the scheme, because he waited too long to trade the stocks. "Craig’s conduct, however, caused harm to the US markets and investors by triggering significant stock price drops, which undermine investor confidence," states the SEC filing.

In the indictment, prosecutors allege that Craig's false tweet-storms caused $1.6 million in losses to shareholders.

"The allegations in this indictment describe a significant stock price manipulation committed through the use of social media,” said Acting US Attorney Brian Stretch. “This prosecution makes clear that we will find and prosecute those who commit fraud on our stock exchanges, by any means, no matter where they reside."

The SEC lawsuit and the DOJ indictment each include one charge of securities fraud.

A spokesperson for the US Attorney told Ars that Craig is not yet in custody, and there is no public information yet available about his whereabouts or attorneys.