The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has taken action today, permanently banning Andrew Donaldson, a former Deutsche Bank foreign exchange (FX) options and futures trader, from providing financial services following his misconduct and falsification of information, according to an ASIC report.
Mr. Donaldson’s ban stems from several instances back in 2013 when he falsified large numbers of entries in Deutsche Bank’s records. In doing so, Mr. Donaldson temporarily offset trading losses he had suffered and artificially increased his reported trading profits, to the detriment of Deutsche Bank.
Internal Irregularities
This came to a head in an internal Australian Management Accounting revenue report from Deutsche bank, resulting in an overstatement of roughly €28.0 million. Fortunately, the issue was isolated to Deutsche Bank’s internal accounting and no external parties were affected, however, the conduct was summarily reported to ASIC, prompting action.
Consequently, an ASIC delegate decreed that during this period at Deutsche Bank, Mr. Donaldson had contravened a financial services law, given his engagement in misleading and deceptive conduct in relation to a financial product. For its part, Deutsche Bank had conducted an investigation of its own and identified issues and vulnerabilities that it had faced, subsequently notifying ASIC of the measures it believes it can more effectively monitor and detect in the future to allay such misconduct.
According to ASIC’s Commissioner Cathie Armour in a recent statement on the findings: “The integrity of our financial markets is vitally important and ASIC will take action to remove anyone in the financial services industry who engages in conduct that undermines this integrity.”
“This action is also a reminder to financial institutions to ensure that they have the right systems, people and processes in place to monitor trading conduct and detect and address trading discrepancies in a timely manner,” she added.
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