ASIC bans former stockbroking firm AR



The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has banned a former client adviser and authorised representative of stockbroking and wealth management firm, Morgans Financial Limited.
Ryan Batros from Melbourne was prohibited from providing financial services for five years after an ASIC delegate found following a hearing that Batros breached financial services laws.
Batros was an authorised representative at Morgans between January 2012 and August 2014.
He was banned after an ASIC investigation into his conduct on 25 and 26 August 2014 in placing "execution only" orders on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) that he had received from clients to sell shares and options of Metals of Africa (MTA) when he possessed information about an upcoming capital-raising by MTA.
MTA announced the capital-raising to the ASX on 3 September, 2014.
Batros has applied to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal for a review of ASIC's banning order.
ASIC imposed licensing conditions on Morgans Financial in November 2015 after it found several breach incidents over a number of years, and found flaws in its monitoring and supervising arrangements of representatives.
Recommended for you
A quarter of advisers who commenced on the FAR within the last two years have already switched licensees or practices, adding validity to practice owners’ professional year (PY) concerns.
Integrated wealth and financial services group Rethink has launched a financial planning arm called Rethink Wealth to expand beyond property investing and into holistic wealth management.
While adviser numbers continue to slowly creep back up, the latest Wealth Data analysis reveals they would actually be in the green for the calendar year if it weren’t for so many losses in the limited advice space.
Iress has appointed a chief AI officer to spearhead the fintech’s strategic focus on AI, with chief executive Marcus Price describing how the technology opens the doors to a “new frontier for wealth advice”.