The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) has reduced the banning period for former Macquarie advisers, Mark Alexander Landau and Marcus Roderick Campbell, from 10 years to 18 months.
Mr Landau of Balmain, New South Wales (formerly of Toorak Gardens, South Australia) and Mr Campbell of South Brighton, South Australia, were banned by ASIC’s Financial Services and Credit Panel from providing financial services for 10 years on 10 August 2018 (18-271MR).
The AAT delivered its decision on 8 February 2019, following Mr Landau and Mr Campbell’s application for review. The AAT found Mr Landau and Mr Campbell’s conduct in falsifying email exchanges with clients and saving those falsified emails to Macquarie’s central system for recording client advice, and entering false transaction records into Macquarie’s order management system was:
- misleading or deceptive in breach of section 1041H of the Corporations Act; and
- dishonest.
In reducing the banning period, the AAT took into account that none of Mr Landau and Mr Campbell’s clients, nor Macquarie, suffered loss, the misconduct involved isolated acts and was not for personal gain. The AAT was ‘satisfied that neither of them will in the future engage in similar misconduct.’
ASIC is considering the AAT decision.
A copy of the AAT’s decision and reasons for decision can be found here.
Background
The Financial Services and Credit Panel (FSCP) is a pool of industry participants that ASIC draws upon when forming individual sitting panels (sitting panels). Each sitting panel comprises two members from the FSCP and an ASIC staff member. Sitting panels operate alongside our existing administrative decision-making processes for retail financial services and credit activities by providing an element of peer review.
Sitting panels decide whether we will make banning orders against individuals for misconduct in the course of providing retail financial services and/or engaging in credit activities. A banning matter may be referred to an individual sitting panel where we consider it appropriate for peer review because of its significance, complexity or novelty (17-388MR).
