The Financial Conduct Authority has given Paul Reynolds (formerly known as Paul Brian Reynolds) a £290,344 penalty on the basis that he "is not fit and proper because he lacks integrity".
Between 2005 and 2010, while he was an approved person at Aspire Personal Finance Limited, based in Birmingham, Mr Reynolds recommended a number of complex and high risk products to his clients, many of whom were on low incomes and had little or no investment experience.
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The FCA said Mr Reynolds "was aware that he could not justify the suitability of these products for his clients".
The regulator said in a statement: "In some cases, Mr Reynolds' clients were unaware that they had invested in unregulated investments and were not told of the associated risks. Suitability letters found on the clients' files, which did explain the risks, had not been sent to the clients."
Georgina Philippou, acting director of enforcement and market oversight at the FCA, said: "People should be able to trust advisers to recommend products which will suit their needs. Today's fine reflects the fact that we will not hesitate to take action against firms or individuals who fail to put the best interests of their clients first."
On 13 January 2014, Mr Reynolds referred the FCA's Decision Notice to the Upper Tribunal. On 30 April 2015, Mr Reynolds withdrew his reference.
According to the final notice document, Mr Reynolds advised six of the eight clients with which the case was concerned to invest a total of approximately £1.5 million in GTEPs and seven of those clients to invest at least £591,480 in UCIS, either directly with providers or indirectly through a self-invested personal pension or a wrap platform.
A number of the UCIS in which Mr Reynolds' clients invested were suspended, resulting in financial losses.
The FCA said: "Six of these clients had low incomes and/or little or no investment experience and these complex and high risk products were likely to be unsuitable for their needs. In addition, in some instances clients were not aware that they had invested in unregulated investments, or of the associated risks.
"Mr Reynolds recommended that the six clients to whom he recommended GTEPs take out a significant amount of highly-geared finance to fund these. In reliance on this advice, clients re-mortgaged their residential properties, three of which were mortgage-free at the time of seeking advice from Mr Reynolds, to fund these high risk investments.
"Of the seven clients who invested in UCIS, three were within ten years of retirement age and were encouraged to invest a significant proportion of their pension funds (more than 80%) in these products, with little or no means to make up any shortfall in the event of a loss."
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During its investigation, the FCA said it found that Mr Reynolds:
• recklessly recommended high risk investment products to eight retail clients, when he was aware that he could not justify their suitability
• was involved in retrospectively creating documents which explained the risks of the products for client files and represented that they were contemporaneous and had been sent to his clients
• was involved in retrospectively creating signatures purporting to be the signatures of two clients on sophisticated investor certificates to suggest that UCIS products could legitimately be promoted to them
• was involved in producing inflated valuations to conceal the poor performance of the investments that he had recommended
• made investments on behalf of two clients without their knowledge or authorisation
• was involved in submitting loan facility and investment applications, on behalf of a number of his clients, which contained inflated incomes and other false and misleading information.