The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has fined New York-based Aegis Capital Corp. US$2.3 million for failing to prevent 14 of its brokers from fraudulently selling unsuitable structured products to investors that included retired elderly clients who lost up to hundreds of thousands.
The US regulator is seeking a jury trial for former Aegis managing director Alan Appelbaum, a worker with a lengthy disciplinary history who allegedly sold 140 of the variable interest rate structured products (VRSPs) to seven customers, often in unauthorised trades. According to the regulator’s complaint, the firm’s MD and several of its registered representatives made unsuitable recommendations of highly complex variable interest rate structured products ("VRSPs") ‘desp