VSE Fines Brink again:
VSE fines Vancouver bsed investment dealer
TORONTO (CP) - The Vancouver Stock Exchange has slapped investment
dealer Brink Hudson and Lefever Ltd. with a $125,000 penalty for the
second time in less than two years.
In all, the small Vancouver-based firm, which caters mainly to individual clients, has -been fined four times in three years by the VSE, a total of $273,500, including costs.
Friday's penalty concerns the firm's failure to supervise two former salesmen. The two salesmen were fined a total of $170,000, including costs, last year for a string of rule breaches, including unauthorized trades in client accounts and deceptive trading.
In April 1996, Brink Hudson was fined $125,000, the second-biggest VSE
fine against an investment dealer. That was also for failing to supervise its sales force.
The most serious misconduct involved former salesman Ranbir Dhaliwal.
The VSE said in a notice released Friday that Brink Hudson was aware
Dhaliwal opened trading accounts for a client with a criminal record for security-related convictions.
Brink, having accepted the account, failed to adequately supervise the client's activities, the notice says. As well, Dhaliwal received secret commissions in the form of shares from a client and exercised unauthorized or discretionary trades in several clients'accounts.
The VSE said Brink Hudson failed to question the excessive value of trading and commissions in Dhaliwal's clients' accounts. He was fined $145,000,including costs, last year.
With the second former salesman, Puneet Sharan, the notice says Brink
Hudson failed to detect deceptive and misleading trading patterns in a
VSE-listed company he was buying and selling. Sharan was fined $25,000
last year, including costs.
(The Globe and Mail) |
