Securities: HK's SFC issues ban for forging signatures, faking AML CDD
Peggy YAM Chin Yui was employed by CITIC Ka Wah Bank but now she has been banned from the securities industry in Hong Kong after it was found that she forged signatures on documents to circumvent internal controls for customer due diligence.
YAM has been banned from re-entering the industry for 18 months from 29 December 2010 to 28 June 2012 for forging her colleagues’ signatures on banking documents. Yam is currently not registered with the HKMA or licensed with the SFC.
Based on the evidence gathered by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) which referred the case to the SFC, Yam was found to have deliberately circumvented her employer’s internal control procedures in relation to verification of banking documents. CITIC Ka Wah’s internal procedures required that banking documents be initialled by designated bank officers to verify their accuracy or authenticity.
Between August and December 2006, Yam forged the initials of three fellow bank officers on six different occasions on 13 banking documents including:
* a register recording issuance of passwords for internet banking services;
* various copies of clients’ identity cards;
* documents in support of the purchase of a cashier order by a client; and
* an order instruction of a corporate client.
Yam admitted that she forged her colleagues’ initials on the relevant documents to speed up processing of the relevant transactions and to avoid troubling her colleagues.
In deciding to ban Yam, the SFC considered:
* Yam’s forgery was dishonest;
* her misconduct happened over five months;
* she had not profited from her forgery;
* no client suffered any loss;
* she cooperated with the HKMA and SFC by admitting liability and showing contrition; and
* Yam had a clean disciplinary record.
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