The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) announced that because of its mutual fund waiver initiative, it has arrived at a settlement with 56 broker-dealers that will provide almost 110,000 retirement and charitable accounts with $89M in restitution. Two of the firms, Western International Securities and Park Avenue Securities, settled on…
Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin has filed charges against broker-dealer Janney Montgomery Scott accusing the firm of not properly supervising broker Stephen Querzoli during his trading of Class A mutual fund shares from 2012 to 2017. According to the state regulator, these alleged mutual fund sales violations caused…
79 investment advisors have settled charges brought by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) accusing them of not properly disclosing conflicts of interests involving the sale of costlier mutual fund share classes that caused them to earn more fees. The regulator’s action is related to its Share Class Section…
Virginia Regulator Fines UBS Financial After Its Broker Makes Unsuitable Recommendations To settle charges brought by Virginia’s State Corporate Commission accusing a UBS (UBS) broker of making unsuitable recommendations involving gold and precious metals securities to 18 clients, UBS Financial Services will pay $319K—$289K to the clients and $30K to…
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (Finra) has permanently barred fired Merrill Lynch broker Bhenoy (Ben) Dembla. According to InvestmentNews, The former broker was let go from the financial firm in 2016 for “falsifying documents” related to mutual fund sales. Dembla, who worked for Merrill the entire time he was a…
Lincoln Investment Planning to Pay Clients For Not Giving Discounts on Mutual Fund Shares FINRA is ordering broker-dealer Lincoln Investment Planning to pay $1.37M to clients to whom it did not give the discounts they were entitled to when they purchased mutual fund A shares between 1/2011 and 6/2018. The…
Direct Services LLC and Voya Investment LLC, two Voya Holdings Inc. investment adviser subsidiaries, will pay about $3.6M to settle Securities and Exchange Commission charges accusing them of failing to make certain disclosures related to securities lending. Of that amount, over $2M will go straight to mutual funds that were…
The US Securities and Exchange Commission has filed civil charges against Ameriprise Financial Services (AMP). The regulator is accusing the brokerage firm and investment adviser of recommending to retail retirement account customers that they purchase mutual fund shares that charged higher fees. Ameriprise purportedly failed to employ sales charge waivers…
The LJM Preservation and Growth Fund (LJMIX, LJMAX, LJMCX) is facing allegations that it made false and misleading statements to investors. In particular, the fund represented that it was appropriate for capital preservation investors who wanted conservative growth of their account. In reality, the mutual fund exposed investors to high…
Two Brokers Barred After Not Appearing at FINRA Hearings Guillermo Valladolid, an ex-Morgan Stanley (MS) broker, has been barred by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. According to the regulator, Valladolid did not show up at a hearing into whether, according to InvestmentNews, he “sold investments away from his employer” and…