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The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) has permanently banned a former mutual fund rep who has been sent to prison for six years after admitting to 15 counts of fraud against his former clients and others.

The OSC issued a decision, ordering that Paul Yoannou, a former advisor with Investors Group, be permanently banned from trading, registration, and utilizing exemptions. The ban was ordered based on the fact that Yoannou was convicted of 15 counts of fraud, sentenced to six years in prison, and ordered to pay $6.6 million in restitution to both his former firm and fraud victims, in 2013. The sentence followed a guilty plea.

He has already been banned permanently by the Mutual Fund Dealers Association of Canada (MFDA), after an MFDA hearing panel found that Yoannou misappropriated at least $6 million from clients and others.

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OSC staff sought their own ban against Yoannou in order to protect investors in Ontario, and the capital markets.

The OSC ordered the ban based on the court decision against him, and his own admissions, as part of the criminal trial; ruling, “that it is necessary to protect Ontario investors and the integrity of Ontario’s capital markets to impose market conduct restrictions against [Yoannou] in the public interest.”

He did not appear, and was not represented at the hearing to consider the proposed OSC ban.