ASIC bans adviser for exposing clients
TheAustralian Securities and Investments Commission(ASIC) has banned a Perth-based investment adviser from acting as an authorised representative of a securities dealer or an investment adviser for 18 months.
The banning of Robert John Gibellini follows an investigation by the peak regulator, which found the WA-based adviser had failed to comply with the Corporations Act in so far as taking reasonable care in matching client needs to the investments he recommended.
ASIC also found Gibellini failed to act honestly, efficiently and fairly in his capacity as an adviser.
He was found to have advised a number of clients to borrow funds against the equity in their homes and invest the borrowings in non-diversified, high risk, illiquid vehicles, which were effectively mass marketed tax schemes.
“ASIC expects those who provide investment advice to ensure that clients are placed in investments that are likely to satisfy their needs and without exposing them to risks with which those clients would be uncomfortable if they were properly informed about those risks”' ASIC director of enforcement Mark Steward says.
Meanwhile a former director of a company associated with the failed Wattle Group was last week convicted in the Brisbane District Court on 11 charges of being knowingly concerned in the promotion of prescribed interests, in contravention of the Corporations Act.
Graeme Charles Coote, a former director of Brisbane-based The Fund Administrators Pty Ltd (TFA), was convicted and released after agreeing to a $5,000 good behaviour bond for three years.
The week before, Coote’s former colleague David Christopher Smith, also a former director of TFA along with Gold Coast company, Spectrum Fund Administration was convicted and released after agreeing to the same bond.
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