Lendingtree Inc

A top executive of financial services company LendingTree Inc. has been indicted on federal charges stemming from insider trading tied to the purchase of the company by USA Interactive in 2003. The indictment of the senior vice president, David Anderson, was filed under seal this month. It was made public Monday when he appeared before a federal magistrate and was released on bond.

The Securities and Exchange Commission said Thursday that it fined a former LendingTree Inc. executive $219,000 for allegedly providing tips used in insider trading of the company's stock before a 2003 takeover by Barry Diller's USA Interactive. David N. Anderson, once a senior vice president of the Internet-based home-loan information service, tipped off three co-workers and a friend to the takeover, the SEC said.

A former vice president of LendingTree Inc., an Internet-based loan matchmaker, pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice for lying to the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to the U.S. attorney's office in North Carolina. Brian Paquette faces as many as five years in prison and a $250,000 fine, according to the plea agreement with the federal prosecutor.

Online mortgage finder LendingTree has agreed to buy Internet-based direct mortgage lender HomeLoanCenter.com of Irvine. Terms weren't disclosed. The transaction, which is expected to close by year's end, would expand LendingTree's operations beyond its core business of matching consumers with lenders into direct lending. Privately held HomeLoanCenter.com employs about 800. Charlotte, N.C.-based LendingTree is a division of IAC/Interactive Corp. IAC shares fell 55 cents to $22.19 on Nasdaq.

When Anthony Hsieh isn't running his Irvine-based online mortgage company, he regularly skippers a 60-foot yacht, plying the seas in search of quarter-ton marlin and other outsize billfish. But this month, it was Hsieh who was hooked. The 39-year-old is selling his Home LoanCenter.com to LendingTree, a unit of IAC/InterActiveCorp that matches borrowers and lenders. Terms of the deal, expected to close by year's end, were not disclosed.

Barry Diller's USA Interactive, expanding the range of goods and services it sells on the Internet, agreed to purchase LendingTree Inc. for $734 million in stock. Shareholders of LendingTree, a Web-based loan service, will receive 0.6199 of a share of USA common stock for each share of LendingTree common stock they own, the companies said. LendingTree shares rose as much as 45%.