The Ontario Securities Commission has imposed a permanent cease trade order on Foreign Capital Corp., Montpellier Group Inc. and Pierre Montpellier for their roles in defruading investors of more than $5 million.

In addition, the commission ordered that Pierre Montpellier be permanently prohibited from becoming or acting as a director or officer of any issuer, and terminated his registration under the Securities Act.

On April 14, 2004, Pierre Montpellier pled guilty to fraud and theft. Specifically, he agreed that he had defrauded 128 investors in Foreign Capital Corporation of $5,347,300 by falsely representing to them that their funds would be invested in private placement programs. At the time of these offences, he was a licensed mutual funds salesman, and was offering investment counselling services through the offices of the Montpellier Group Inc. located in Sudbury, Ontario.

Describing the respondents’ actions as “conspicuously offensive”, the Commission found that “Montpellier’s egregious conduct goes to the very essence of the duties and responsibilities of a registrant under the Act. His contravention of obligations under the Act is illustrative of a most grave type of failure by a registrant”.

The OSC concluded that Montpellier’s “disregard of the foreseeable consequences of his conduct to marketplace participants and his monetary greed, convinced us that if we do not restrain Montpellier properly, confidence in our markets would be weakened”.