NEW YORK, July 10 (Reuters) - A jury in Manhattan

federal court reached a verdict on Wednesday in the criminal

case against Archegos Capital Management founder Sung Kook

"Bill" Hwang, accused by prosecutors of manipulating stock

prices before the 2021 collapse of his $36 billion private

investment firm.

The judge in the case announced that the verdict has been

reached. It will be disclosed in open court. U.S. District Judge

Alvin Hellerstein instructed jurors on the law before they began

their deliberations on Tuesday in the trial of Hwang and Patrick

Halligan, his Archegos deputy and co-defendant.

The trial began in May.

Hwang, 60, has pleaded not guilty to one count of

racketeering conspiracy and 10 counts of fraud and market

manipulation. Halligan, 47, has pleaded not guilty to fraud and

racketeering conspiracy. Halligan is the former Archegos chief

financial officer.

If convicted, they face maximum sentences of 20 years in

prison on each charge, though any sentence would likely be much

lower and would be imposed by the judge based on a range of

factors.

Prosecutors and defense lawyers delivered closing arguments

to the jurors on Monday.

Hwang's lawyer said the prosecution has criminalized

aggressive but legal trading methods. A federal prosecutor said

Hwang and Halligan unlawfully pumped up stock prices and lied

about the holdings of Archegos to the banks with which they

traded.

The implosion of Archegos left global banks nursing billions

in losses and, according to prosecutors, caused more than $100

billion in shareholder losses at companies in its portfolio.

Prosecutors have accused Hwang of secretly amassing outsized

stakes in multiple companies without actually holding their

stock. They have said Hwang lied to banks about the size of

Archegos' derivative positions to borrow billions of dollars

that he and his deputies then used to inflate the underlying

stocks.

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern

District of New York, which brought the case, Hwang's positions

eclipsed those of the companies' largest investors, driving up

stock prices. At its peak, prosecutors said Archegos had $36

billion in assets and $160 billion of exposure to equities.

When stock prices fell in March 2021, the banks demanded

additional deposits, which Archegos could not make. The banks

then sold the stocks backing Hwang's swaps, wiping out $100

billion in value for shareholders and billions at the banks,

including $5.5 billion for Credit Suisse, now part of UBS

, and $2.9 billion for Nomura Holdings ( NMR ).