Following an investigation by ob体育 and a hearing, ob体育 has banned Mr Shane Thompson of New Gisborne, Victoria, from providing financial services and credit activities for seven years.
Mr Thompson was employed by National Australia Bank (NAB) during the time the misconduct for which he was banned, took place.
ob体育 banned Mr Thompson after finding he contravened financial services laws and that he was not a fit and proper person to also engage in credit activities.
ob体育's investigation found that between December 2012 and February 2013, Mr Thompson engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct by:
- Preparing and completing 'Change of adviser' forms including the forging of client signatures without clients' knowledge or authorisation;
- Submitting the false 'Change of Adviser' forms to mislead the product issuer into聽 transferring general NAB clients to his personal financial planning client list; and
- Receiving the financial planning remuneration benefit that flowed from processing these false forms.
ob体育 Deputy Chair Peter Kell said ob体育's Wealth Management Project was removing from industry financial advisers who did not meet the standards ob体育 and the community expected.
'ob体育's action against Mr Thompson should serve as a lesson to any financial advisers committing similarly brazen misconduct: ob体育 will ban you.'
Mr Thompson has the right to apply to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal for a review and stay of ob体育's decision.
Background
This outcome is a result of ob体育's Wealth Management Project. The Wealth Management Project was established in October 2014 with the objective of lifting standards by major financial advice providers. The Wealth Management Project focuses on the conduct of the largest financial advice firms (NAB, Westpac, CBA, ANZ, AMP and Macquarie).
ob体育's work in the Wealth Management Project covers a number of areas including:
(i) Working with the largest financial advice firms to address the identification and remediation of non-compliant advice.
(ii) Seeking regulatory outcomes where appropriate against Licensees and advisers. For example, as part of its Wealth Management Project ob体育 has banned the following advisers from the financial services industry, in addition to Mr Thompson:
- Ben Rickman (refer:)
- Ben Cheung (refer:)
- Mark Tidbury (refer: )
- Amanda Ritchie (refer: )
- Stuart Murray Jamieson (refer:聽)
- Sharnie Kent (refer: )
- Alfie Chong (refer: )
- Martin Hodgetts (refer: )
- Shawn Hickman (refer: )
- Brett O'Malley (refer: )
- Brian Farber (refer: ), and
- Rebecca Locksley (refer: )