Cornwall mutual fund adviser gets three year suspension, fined $7,500

CORNWALL – A Canadian regulator has fined a Cornwall investment adviser $7,500 and stripped him of mutual fund securities trading for three years for falsifying paperwork.

The Mutual Fund Dealers Association of Canada (MFDA) held a settlement hearing Dec. 14 in Toronto after Luke Bedard agreed to settle his case in late July.

Bedard is a Cornwall employee at 207 Second Street East for the Kingston-based company called Professional Investments. It’s been an MFDA member since 2002.

The three-person tribunal ruled Bedard had doctored 65 client initials on account forms for 17 customers and used those forms to conduct transactions between 2011 and 2015. It also found that Bedard had 248 pre-signed account forms for 47 clients.

The panel also ruled Bedard had misled investigators by telling them he didn’t have clients sign account forms before they are complete, contrary to the evidence uncovered by the MFDA.

“Basically, it takes him out of the mutual fund industry (for three years),” Charles Toth, director of litigation with the MFDA, told Cornwall Newswatch.

Bedard will also have to pay legal costs of $2,500.

The MFDA panel will release the reasons for its decision and the formal settlement agreement at a later date.