The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) has reprimanded Ms Winnie Pang Wai Yan and fined her $120,000 for negligence in handling a client’s trade orders (Note 1).
Pang was a client advisor assistant at UBS AG at the material time. In December 2009, a client at UBS AG wanted to sell his shares in a stock to an identified buyer at agreed amounts and prices through manual cross trades. Instead of placing cross trades as initially instructed by the client, Pang coordinated with the buyer to conduct a series of on-exchange matched trades between 3 and 8 December 2009 (Note 2).
The SFC found that, in handling the client’s orders, Pang did not:
- exercise sufficient care in making enquiries in relation to the relevant transactions to ascertain the client’s intention;
- report the matter to the Compliance Department of UBS AG; and
- refrain from acting on the client’s instructions before she was satisfied that the orders and their execution did not affect the best interests of the integrity of the market.
The SFC considers that Pang’s failures called into question her fitness and properness as a registered person.
In deciding the disciplinary sanction, the SFC took into account:
- Pang’s financial situation;
- that Pang did not make any personal benefit out of the transactions in question;
- that there is insufficient evidence to prove to the requisite standard that the matched trades were carried out with manipulative intent;
- that the matched trades had minimal impact on the nominal price of the stock;
- that Pang co-operated with the SFC in resolving the disciplinary action; and
- that Pang has an otherwise clean disciplinary record with the SFC.
End
Notes:
- Pang has been registered as a relevant individual with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and engaged by UBS AG to carry on Type 1 (dealing in securities) regulated activity since 20 February 2006.
- Under section 274(5)(b) and section 295(5)(b) of the Securities and Futures Ordinance, a person may have committed the offence of false trading or be regarded as having engaged in the market misconduct of false trading if a person offers to sell securities at a price that is substantially the same as the price at which he has made or proposes to make, or he knows an associate of his has made or proposes to make, an offer to buy substantially the same number of securities, unless the transaction in question is an off-market transaction. This type of trading is commonly known as matched orders.
