The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has cancelled the Australian financial services licence of Sovereign Capital Limited.
The regulator announced this afternoon that it had cancelled the licence after finding Sovereign’s activities “have been well below the standard a reasonable person would expect of a financial services licensee”.
It said that in particular it had been concerned about Sovereign’s conduct in relation to disclosure, management of conflicts, due diligence and fairness between investors, finding that, amongst other things, the company had not operated the fund in an efficient, honest and fair manner, acted in accordance with financial services laws or complied with its obligations as a licensee.
The Sovereign Prudential Fund is involved in lending money to property developers in NSW, Queensland and Victoria and ASIC intervened early last month after an application sought by Sovereign to wind up the fund.
