FCA bans and fines two directors for SIPP failings

Lloyd Pope has been fined £93,800, but Peter Legerton escaped a £84,000 fine due to financial hardship.

The FCA said that both men failed to ensure TMI assessed the suitability of investments made through self-invested personal pensions for its customers, and failed to ensure that TMI identified and managed its conflicts of interests. They also failed to oversee properly TMI’s compliance function, which had been outsourced to external consultants.

Legerton also benefited financially from poorly managed conflicts of interest between TMI and an unregulated firm that introduced new business to TMI. TMI’s customers typically invested in high risk investments and more than half of them invested in overseas property operated by the Harlequin group of companies, which are under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office.

Georgina Philippou, acting director of enforcement and market oversight, said:    

"Pope and Legerton exposed customers to risky investments without considering if these products met their needs. Their actions mean many customers face losing all of their hard earned pension funds and fell woefully short of the standards we expect of senior individuals."

TMI provided advice to customers on transferring their existing pension funds into unregulated investments such as green oil, biofuels, farmland and overseas property via SIPPs. Between 2010 and 2013, 1,661 customers invested £112,420,985 in these investment products, many of which were not typically permitted by their existing pension schemes.

As directors with responsibility for the management and oversight of TMI, Pope and Legerton should have ensured that TMI considered the suitability of the investment products for customers but failed to do so.

They were also responsible for managing a number of conflicts of interest – including one created by commission payments to Legerton which he received when these investment products were sold to customers directly or through an unregulated firm which introduced customers to TMI for SIPP advice. During the relevant period Legerton’s total income from TMI was £300,567.

An FCA statement said:

"These payments created a conflict of interest and so should have been identified, and then disclosed to customers. However, no adequate disclosure was made.

"The issue was compounded by Pope and Legerton’s failure to act quickly when TMI’s external compliance consultants warned them of the need to consider and disclose conflicts of interest to their customers."

TMI has ceased trading and is now in liquidation. The Financial Services Compensation Scheme is investigating claims made by TMI’s customers.

The FCA wrote to the CEOs of all SIPP firms in 2014 asking them to take action to ensure that their business operates within the FCA’s rules.