ob体育 has permanently banned Queensland financial adviser Mr Warren Scott Acworth from providing financial services.
The banning follows an ob体育 investigation into Mr Acworth鈥檚 conduct between December 2015 and May 2018 while working as an adviser with Macquarie Equities Limited.
The conduct concerned trading Mr Acworth undertook on behalf of a client in MINI warrants (a form of derivative).聽
ob体育 found Mr Acworth had engaged in misleading conduct relating to a financial product and was dishonest in that he:
- misrepresented to his聽client the value of the client鈥檚 portfolio on 19 separate occasions;
- engaged聽in trading without proper authority of the client; and
- transferred聽$185,000 between the client鈥檚 accounts without authority.
Based on his conduct, ob体育 also found Mr Acworth is not of good fame and character to provide financial services.
Mr Acworth鈥檚 banning is recorded on ob体育鈥檚 .
Mr Acworth has the right to appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal for a review of ob体育鈥檚 decision.
Background
The banning of Mr Acworth is part of ob体育's Wealth Management Project. The Wealth Management Project was established in October 2014 to lift the standards of major financial advice providers. The Wealth Management Project focuses on the conduct of the largest financial advice firms (NAB, Westpac, CBA, ANZ and AMP).
A MINI warrant is a form of derivative in that it derives its value from another asset which is commonly referred to as the 鈥榰nderlying instrument鈥� or 鈥榬eference asset鈥�. The underlying instrument of a MINI warrant may be, among other things, a share, a share price index (including the S&P/ASX 200 Index), a currency or a commodity.