The Alberta Securities Commission (ASC) has found that Edmonton-based Lorne Drever and two companies he manages, Locate Technologies Inc. and 706166 Alberta Co., violated Alberta securities laws, including a past ASC order.
An ASC panel ordered Locate Technologies, 706166 Alberta Co. and Drever to pay a $300,000 administrative penalty and $20,000 in costs.
The panel also permanently banned:
- Locate Technologies, 706166 Alberta Co. and Drever from trading in any securities;
- Locate Technologies and 706166 Alberta Co. from using Alberta securities laws exemptions; and
- Drever from acting as a director or officer or director of any issuer.
Drever, Locate Technologies and 706166 Alberta Co. were subject to a 2008 ASC cease trade order. The ASC panel found that, despite this, Drever authorized or permitted Locate Technologies to sell shares to Alberta investors in 2010, and met with those investors to solicit further investment. The panel found that this was an illegal distribution which breached the 2008 ASC order. The panel also found that Locate Technologies and Drever made prohibited representations to the investors, such as stating that Locate Technologies shares would soon be listed on an exchange in the United States.
Further breaches arose from Drever having authorized or permitted the filing of draft prospectuses with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for distributions of Locate Technologies shares without filing a corresponding prospectus with the ASC.
The ASC panel described the violations of the 2008 ASC trading bans as indicating “sheer defiance of the law and securities regulatory authority. We discern on the part of Locate and Drever a profound contempt for our securities regulatory system and the basic investor-protection and market-confidence objectives.” The ASC panel also determined that Drever, Locate Technologies and 706166 Alberta Co. posed a “grave and persistent threat” to Alberta investors and the capital market “unless tightly constrained by rigorous and permanent sanctions.”