Hong Kong's Securities And Futures Commission Suspends Wu Li Jun For Six Months

The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) has suspended Ms Wu Li Jun, a former employee of China Merchants Securities (HK) Co., Limited (China Merchants Securities), for six months from 3 July 2014 to 2 January 2015 (Note 1).

The disciplinary action follows an SFC investigation which found that between September and December 2011:

Wu made nine deposits in the total sum of $15,831,032 for various clients to China Merchants Securities’ segregated accounts for holding client monies. Wu knew that China Merchants Securities did not permit her to make cash deposits on behalf of her clients in their absence. She nevertheless disregarded the requirement and deliberately circumvented its internal control procedures governing the ways in which client deposits should be made to China Merchants Securities.
Wu failed to properly and adequately safeguard client assets as she had put her clients’ interests at risk by allowing her clients to deposit their monies into her personal bank account or a third party’s bank account before the monies were deposited into China Merchants Securities’ segregated accounts.

The SFC considers that Wu’s conduct called into question her fitness and properness to be a licensed person. In deciding the penalty, the SFC took into account all relevant circumstances, including that:

there is no evidence that Wu obtained any monetary benefits in the money transfer process;
Wu promptly deposited money received from the clients into China Merchants Securities’ segregated accounts; and
Wu has an otherwise clean disciplinary record.

Notes:

Wu was licensed as a representative under the Securities and Futures Ordinance to carry on Type 1 (dealing in securities) and Type 2 (dealing in futures contracts) regulated activities and was accredited to China Merchants Securities (HK) Co., Limited and China Merchants Futures (HK) Co., Limited between 25 January 2006 and 14 January 2014. Wu is currently not accredited to any licensed corporation.
A copy of the Statement of Disciplinary Action in relation to the matter is available on the SFC website.