Lai See | The SFC finally gets its man - third time lucky

We see that the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) has finally nailed Andrew Mantel, chief executive of Pacific Sun Advisors, on its third attempt. Pacific Sun and Mantel were convicted on Tuesday at the Tsuen Wan Court on four charges of issuing advertisements to promote a collective investment scheme without the authorisation of the SFC.

Pacific Sun was fined HK$20,000 and Mantel was sentenced to four weeks' imprisonment, suspended for 12 months. They were also charged with advertising the fund via unauthorised e-mails.

Pacific Sun and Mantel were initially acquitted in March 2013 after arguing that the advertisements fell within an exemption that applied to sales limited to professional investors.

The SFC appealed to the High Court, which ruled that the advertisements did not fall within the exemption and ordered the case to be returned to Tsuen Wan Court.

The SFC argued the exemption did not permit advertisements that had not been authorised by the SFC to be issued to the public and that in this case there was no evidence the fund was only intended for or had only been sold to professional investors. Some years ago Mantel wrote to Lai See to say the SFC had tried to deprive him of his licence twice before, only to have it reinstated on both occasions on appeal.

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