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FINRA is currently reviewing its rules regarding outside business activities and private securities transactions. From time to time, FINRA reviews its rules and application of those rules to see if anything needs to be tweaked. Is there any significance to FINRA looking at these particular rules?

From my experience, some bad brokers have used the outside business activity disclosure process as the tool to cover their tracks while engaging in activity that the firm would otherwise want to know about. In some case, the undisclosed outside business turned out to be a Ponzi scheme.Core Values

The purpose of requiring outside business disclosures is for a firm to make sure that it and its clients know about any conflicts of interest that their brokers may have. For example, the firm would want to know if the broker had a real estate broker’s license because that business may compete with the time the broker can give to her securities investing clients.

FINRA exploring this area should be a message to firms that they need to ask critical questions about what they are doing regarding outside business disclosures.

Ask yourself:

  • Are you doing enough to make sure you receive honest and complete disclosures?
  • What, if any, ramifications are there for incomplete or untimely disclosures?
  • Are you asking enough follow-up questions to understand the proposed outside business activity?
  • What follow-up, if any, do you make with brokers who make disclosures?

If you cannot answer these questions, you need to do more homework or be exposed to the bad broker who may be in your midst.

 

One certainty in the brokerage world is that registered representatives often switch from one member firm to another. There is nothing wrong with the switch, but there is a word of caution to be shared.

Before you leave, make sure you only have in your possession, if anything, only those things that the firm you are leaving lets you keep. If you take something you are not allowed to have, you can rest assured that your former employer will come looking for you.Core Values

Similarly, you should determine whether the old or new firms are members of the broker-dealer protocol. If so, you should check the protocol for what you are allowed to take and what notice you have to give to your former employer about the information you are taking with you.

If one or neither firm is a member of the protocol, it still makes sense to follow the protocol. By doing so, you can demonstrate, if ever challenged, that you tried to do the right by following an objective standard that many in the industry have accepted.

Another thing you should verify is whether you are under contract with your old firm to delay your formal commencement with the new firm; otherwise known as a garden leave policy. If so, you had better follow it. If you opt not to follow it, you should expect a disgruntled former employer coming after you.

So change firms if you like. Just be certain you know what you are doing before you do it. A couple missteps here and there could get you in front of FINRA on an enforcement case.

The SEC recently announced that it charged a former broker with knowingly or recklessly trading unsuitable investment products for five customers and taking $170,000 for one of those customers. These charges follow a prior SEC Investor Alert warning about excessive trading and churning as well as another one focused on the risks associated with exchange-traded notes.

The broker must not have read those two alerts. According to the SEC, the broker enriched himself by systematically disregarding client investor profiles. He repeatedly traded in risky, unsuitable and volatile products like leveraged exchange-traded funds and exchange-traded notes.

Money and calculator
Copyright: denikin / 123RF Stock Photo

This case provides a number of lessons that firms should take away. Specifically, the SEC publishes Investor Alerts for a reason. The SEC is doing your work for you by flagging an issue for investors, as well as firms.

The second thing that this case hammers home is that firms must be more diligent in their broker supervision. As part of the firm’s ordinary surveillance, it should have flagged the unsuitable sale of highly volatile products to relatively unsophisticated clients.

A valuable thumb rule to follow is that as the sophistication of the products increases so should the sophistication of the customer buying those products. Although this rule of thumb will not completely stop all bad brokers, it will go a long way toward flagging those brokers before they cause harm to your clients and liability for your firm.

 

The SEC has recently issued an Investor Alert regarding commentary provided about investors from what appear to be independent sources. It turns out, many of those independent sources are not independent at all. Instead, they are paid shills.

The SEC has instituted enforcement actions against such companies for generating deceptive articles on investment websites. Among other things, these companies:

  1. Failed to disclose that they received payment even though companies had paid them directly or indirectly.
  2. Used different pseudonyms to publish multiple articles the promoted the same stock.

    24752961 - grunge rubber stamp with text disclosure,vector illustration
    24752961 – grunge rubber stamp with text disclosure,vector illustration
  3. Falsified their credentials; misrepresenting themselves as accountants or a fund manager, for example.

So where does that leave firms that rely upon commentaries for the sale of stock. For one, if you pay for it, you had better disclose that you paid for it. If you did no pay for it, do a little digging to make sure that the commenter is legitimate. If not, stay away lest the SEC pay a visit.

 

In Notice to Members 17-13, FINRA announced changes to its sanction guidelines. In other words, FINRA has listed its new top hits that it is pursuing. Two items bear particular attention.

First, FINRA has introduced a “new principal consideration that examines whether a respondent has exercised undue influence over a customer.” This guideline reinforces FINRA heightened focus on senior investors and those who may be otherwise vulnerable, such as those with diminished capacity.Core Values

Second, FINRA has introduced a “guideline related to borrowing and lending arrangements between representatives and customers.”   This guideline is particularly alarming in as much as it suggests that associated persons are actively engaging in such transactions even though firms uniformly ban them.

Notice to Members 17-13 is a strong guidepost for your supervision and compliance teams. The guidelines highlight growing problems in FINRA’s eyes. This is a cue that you should be ever vigilant for the same conduct. Otherwise, you may be the focus of the new sanction guideline that addresses systemic supervisory failures.

The SEC recently announced fraud charges, and sought an emergency asset freeze against a pastor who was accused of exploiting church members, retirees, and laid-off autoworkers. Apparently, he mislead these people by purportedly selling them on a successful real estate business.

The pastor cloaked his fraud in faith-based rhetoric, including references to the bible and suggestions that he was praying for investors. As a result, his defrauded investors thought that he was more trustworthy than a banker, investing nearly $7 million in this scheme.

Money and calculator
Copyright: denikin / 123RF Stock Photo

The message here is that fraud lurks everywhere and that affinity schemes are alive and well. Unfortunately, for those defrauded, they had access to public information that may have helped them avoid the fraud.

Neither the pastor nor his investment firm were registered with the SEC. A simple check on the SEC’s investor web side would have revealed no records for the pastor or his firm.

Undoubtedly, he would have still gotten some of those who checked, but look before you leap into an investment. Be wary of those who are focused on a particular group as a source of investing funds; it may be an affinity fraud.

 

Contrary to what the title may suggest, I am not referring to students who are about to graduate from high school or college. Instead, this post is about that group of our society who all too often (based upon my years of defending broker-dealers) are claimants in FINRA arbitrations; senior investors.

As part of its ongoing effort to protect seniors, FINRA recently introduced Rule 2165 and amended Rule 4512. Both rules reflect a growing trend to provide greater protection to seniors.

Rule 2165 allows a member firm who reasonably believes that senior financial exploitation may be occurring to hold for up to 15 business days the disbursement of money or securities from a senior’s account. This rule gives a firm a safe harbor to take action when it reasonably suspects such exploitation. The firm can extend the hold an additional 10 days.

24752961 - grunge rubber stamp with text disclosure,vector illustration
24752961 – grunge rubber stamp with text disclosure,vector illustration

At the same time, FINRA amended Rule 4512 (providing for the firm to make a reasonable effort to obtain the name of a trusted contact person to place on a newly opened account) further defined the trusted person to be someone that the customer authorized the firm to contact and disclose information to in the event that there is possible financial exploitation. Importantly, the firm is only obligated to make a reasonable effort to obtain this information.

So what does all of this mean for the industry? For one, I do not think that FINRA has to paint you a picture to show you how serious it is taking financial exploitation of seniors. Considering the ongoing greying of the baby boomers, this focus will likely become even more heightened as the years pass.

Many people see the green of cannabis as a way to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. If you are going to invest in a legal (at a state level) cannabis business, you need to make sure that you know what you purchase.

Whistleblowers
Copyright: lightwise / 123RF Stock Photo

The SEC recently charged a company and its founder with promoting “record” revenue numbers to investors and touting itself as a leader in the cannabis industry, all the while it generated certain of its earnings from sham transactions through a secret corporate affiliate. The company and its principal agreed to settle the charges, with the principal agreeing to pay $12 million in disgorgement and penalties and accepting a bar from serving as an officer or director of a public company or participating in any penny stocks.

So what do these events tell us? First, there are potential big rewards through investing in this burgeoning industry. Second, there are people looking to take advantage of your desire for large profits.

Investing in these businesses is fine, but make sure your eyes are wide open. Ask question, perform due diligence, and ask more questions. You don’t want to see your investment go up in smoke.

The SEC recently published its latest investor bulletin. The SEC publishes these from time to time to bring awareness to the investing public on certain issues.

The current bulletin notes that the investor.gov web page provides a number of resources for the investing public, which include:

  1. The ability to check on an investment professional.
  2. Self-education about various products.
  3. To learn about online tools to make investing a simpler process.
  4. To learn how to avoid investment fraud.
  5. To stay current with SEC resources.
  6. To start researching public companies.
  7. To consider fees associated with investing.
  8. To gain an understanding of how the market works.
  9. To plan for retirement.
  10. To find SEC contact information.Core Values

For investment professionals, you should be asking yourself why the SEC has issued such guidance. I think that the easy answer requires you to look yourself in the mirror. Apparently, the SEC does not think you are doing a good enough job educating your clients.

The fact that the SEC thinks these are important areas of interest should be notice to you to make sure your own house is in order. Are you doing enough to educate your clients on most of these topics? If not, you may want to revisit your customer service before the SEC does it for you.