The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) of Hong Kong has prohibited Mr Andy Lau Ka Ho, a former licensed representative of Sun Hung Kai Investment Services Limited (SHKIS), Sun Hung Kai Commodities Limited (SHKCOM) and SHK Fund Management Limited (SHKFM), from re-entering the industry for life over serious misconduct.

SHKIS, SHKCOM and SHKFM are now known as Everbright Securities Investment Services (HK) Limited, CES Commodities (HK) Limited and Bright Fund Management Limited respectively.

The disciplinary action follows an SFC investigation triggered by a self-report jointly made by the SHK Entities.

The SFC’s investigation found that, between September 2014 and May 2019, Lau, an account executive at SHKIS during the material time:

• conducted unauthorised trades in a client’s securities trading accounts;
• carried out online trading via the client’s accounts without the client’s knowledge or authorisation;
• sent fabricated trading instructions from the client’s email account to his office email, thereby falsely representing them as instructions from the client;
• provided the client with forged account statements and account summary reports which contained false account information, with most of the forged statements showing significant overstatement of cash balances and net portfolio values; and
• forestalled the client’s cash withdrawal from his accounts by falsely claiming that a 3.94% annual interest rate was available to him for a three-month deposit of $59 million, asserting that the deposit arrangement had been made on his behalf, and providing the client with a forged certificate of deposit confirmation to support the fabricated arrangement.

The regulator determined that Lau’s misconduct was blatantly dishonest and indicative of a pattern of deliberate deceit. His dishonest acts constitute serious breaches of the Code of Conduct and call into question his fitness and properness to be a licensed person.

In determining the sanction against Lau, the SFC has taken into account all relevant circumstances, including that his misconduct persisted for over five years and involved egregious deceptive behaviour.