The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) agreed to a two-year trading ban and $25,000 in costs ordered against a man accused of executing prohibited trades among various discount brokerage accounts he controlled for his family.
The commission approved a settlement Thursday with Stephen Campbell, formerly a senior finance executive in a non-profit organization (he retired in August 2012), concerning trading that he carried out between January 1, 2010 and December 31, 2011 in the common shares and convertible debentures of Discovery Air Inc. The deal notes that he had no connection with the company, other than as an active trader of its securities.
In the approved settlement, Campbell admitted to carrying out prohibited match trades, wash trades, and facilitation trades (which aim to enable the match trading and wash trading) among the 10 accounts he controlled (three each for himself and his wife and four among his children). It says he was aware that this sort of trading was prohibited, and that he was warned several times by various discount brokers, and even had his accounts forcibly closed by one firm.
It notes that his trading activity alone increased the monthly trading volume for the class A common shares of Discovery Air by as much as 24% in December 2010, and the volume for its debentures by over 29% in February 2011. However, it notes that the trades “appear not to have resulted in artificial prices for the traded securities.”
According to the settlement, Campbell fully co-operated with OSC staff’s investigation; he maintained that it was not his intention to create a false or misleading appearance of trading; he has no prior record of securities violations; and his accounts have an unrealized net loss of approximately $157,000 in the Discovery Air securities.