TD Private Client Wealth censured and fined for allegedly failing to review employee emails
The firm failed to place the email accounts of its new employees into the electronic queue established for the review of emails. These problems arose primarily as a result of a lack of adequate procedures as well as poor inter-departmental communication.
In effect nobody seems to have really ‘owned’ the process for this and the firm “relied on an ad hoc and occasional practice of manually comparing a list of new hires with the names of the employees whose email accounts had been placed into the electronic queue”, which meant that the issues were not identified or corrected as quickly as they should have been. We covered the case in detail.
The firm has also agreed to conduct a retrospective review of email sent or received by its associated personnel between February 2013 and June 2022.
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 3110 NASD Rule 3010
Former products representative barred for allegedly refusing to produce information and documents
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 8210
Securities principal suspended and fined for allegedly inaccurately updating a senior customer profile
The customer’s signature was affixed to the inaccurate profile without this customer’s permission.
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 4511
Former products representative suspended and fined for allegedly forging customer signatures
Correctly signed ACH Authorization Agreements contained clerical errors and needed to be re-executed. The representative “copied the electronic signatures from the original agreements and pasted them to the corrected” documents without the consent of the customers in question.
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 4511
Cowen and Company (Cowen) and Cowen Prime censured and fined for alleged compliance failings connected to Regulation NMS Rule 606
The firms’ reports of the handling of customer orders in NMS stocks violated Rule 606.
Cowen Prime:
- failed to disclose its basis for publishing separate Rule 606 reports;
- published non-reportable equities order information;
- failed to publish required options order information;
Cowen
- published quarterly Rule 606 reports late; and
- failed to publish required options information concerning its execution venues.
Neither firm’s supervisory system was reasonably designed to ensure the accuracy of Rule 606 reporting.
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 3110
Securities representative suspended and fined for allegedly entering the incorrect representative code in the firm’s trading system
The representative entered into an agreement with a retired representative and fulfilled his obligations under this, but overrode the firm’s system for 366 trades, which he erroneously believed the agreement did not apply to.
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 4511
Former non-registered fingerprint person suspended and fined for allegedly having and using a cell phone during his exam
FINRA Rule 1210.05 FINRA Rule 2010
Former products representative suspended and fined for allegedly engaging in outside business activity without providing notice to his employer
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 3270
Allied Millennial Partners censured and fined for allegedly failing to file required documents for four private placement offerings
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 5123 FINRA Regulatory Notice 12-40
Former products representative suspended and fined for allegedly engaging in outside business activity without providing notice to his employer
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 3270
Former products representative suspended and fined for allegedly engaging in outside business activity without providing notice to his employer
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 3270
BofA Securities censured and fined for allegedly engaging in spoofing through two former traders
The traders, one of whom was also a supervisor and desk head engaged in 717 instances of spoofing including:
- 525 instances of same-product spoofing where the junior trader “imbalanced the stack and created a false appearance of more demand to induce favourable execution of a bona fide iceberg order to sell the 10-year note”; and
- 192 instances of cross-product spoofing where non-bona fide orders were entered in order to induce execution of bona fide orders at the best offer price; the non-bona fide orders were cancelled immediately following the favourable execution.
The firm’s supervisory procedures, including its surveillance for potential spoofing, were not adequate with only limited surveillance undertaken until 2019. Prior to October 2022 no surveillance for potential cross-product spoofing in the US Treasury market was undertaken at all.
Remediation of the supervisory deficiencies by the firm started in 2019 and was completed in October 2022.
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 3010 FINRA Rule 3110
Former securities representative suspended and fined for allegedly impersonating a customer in two telephone calls to a FINRA member firm
FINRA Rule 2010
Securities representative barred for refusing to produce information or documents requested by FINRA
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 8210
Former products representative suspended and fined for alleged Reg BI violations
The representative recommended the exchange of variable annuities to seven customers without considering the surrender fees, loss of benefits and liquidity resulting from such advice.
In addition the representative provided inaccurate information about the source of funds on transaction documents submitted to the firm, failing “to identify and submit eighteen variable annuity purchases as exchanges” even though these were funded by the sale of another variable annuity.
A restitution of $50,103.43 plus interest has also been ordered.
FINRA Rule 2010 FINRA Rule 2111 FINRA Rule 2330 Reg BI Securities Exchange Act Rule 15l-1
| Unless otherwise noted all respondents accepted and consented to FINRA’s findings without admitting or denying them. |