FSA bans Bromley mortgage broker
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The Financial Services Authority has fined Bromley mortgage broker Dele MacAulay £115,157 for knowingly submitting nine fraudulent mortgage applications for himself, his wife, and his brother.
MacAulay, trading as Dele MacAulay Financial Services, has also been banned from working in regulated financial services.
He is the seventh individual to receive a six figure penalty for knowing involvement in mortgage fraud.
The FSA’s investigation was conducted alongside a criminal investigation by Hertfordshire Constabulary also looking into mortgage fraud committed by MacAulay.
Now that MacAulay has been sentenced to 21 months in prison, details of the FSA’s action can be published.
The FSA’s investigation showed that MacAulay processed nine fraudulent mortgage applications with false income and employment information.
Five were residential mortgages for himself, two were residential mortgages for his wife, and two residential mortgages for his brother.
MacAulay also submitted false tax information to the FSA in his Retail Mediation Activities Return a set of data that forms the basis of regulatory reporting to the FSA.
Margaret Cole, director of enforcemement and financial crime at the FSA, says: “MacAulay abused his position as a mortgage broker for personal gain, but he was caught and has paid a heavy price.
This fine and ban reflect the seriousness of his failings as well as the FSA’s attitude to those who abuse their approved status.
“This case is also a good example of the benefits of a collaborative approach with the police. Between us we have dealt with MacAulay decisively and justice has been done.”
In determining the financial penalty, the FSA considered the benefit obtained by Dele MacAulay as well as the need to punish him and deter others from engaging in this type of activity in line with the FSA’s strategy of ‘credible deterrence’. As a matter of principle, his profit should be disgorged.
“The £115,157 penalty includes disgorging £15,157 profit, and a punitive fine of £100,000.”
Readers' comments (4)
Anonymous | 2 Mar 2010 11:00 pm
Time and again the FSA have been negligent in approving such people and then fining them. Obviously they do not thoroughly check applicants because if they did, these people will be non existent.Refuse to pay the fine because the FSA were negligent in approving them in the first place.This would be treating the FSA fairly in my opinion.
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Anonymous | 4 Mar 2010 3:23 pm
Criticising the FSA for censuring this broker as "the FSA have been negligent in approving" him is astounding. How does the writer know that this broker had performed fraudulant acts prior to being authorised? It's entirely possible that he hadn't, or he hadn't been caught, so how were the FSA to know?
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Anonymous | 4 Mar 2010 10:28 pm
RE: Anon 4.3.10 3.23pm.The FSA were right in censuring the fraudulent broker. My point is that where they are negligent, for example in regulating the banks, how much in penalties were they liable for? A one off is excusable but where numerous such fines have been imposed, there is clearly a filtering problem at the entry stage. There must be stringent checks similar to those undertaken by brokers to eliminate fraud.If the FSA fail to do so they must also be penalised.Or would you prefer double standards?
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Dave Doncaster | 8 Mar 2010 2:43 pm
Will someone please correct me when I get wrong with the following assumptions:
The FSA are responsible for Regulating & Authorising all people within the financial services industry that give advice. The FSA has the power to remove authorisation at any time. The FSA also has the power to inflict any fine it wishes. If an approved person joins a broker firm, then it is the firms responsibility to have done the fitness of that individual. If that individual commits an offence, then the individual and the firm can be held liable for removing of approval or fine........has anyone corrected any of my assumptions yet?
Ok, so having worked all that out, if the approved individual is Directly Authorised......does that not mean that the FSA approved the fitness of that individual?? So how come they never inflict a fine on themselves?? Surely the FSA should also be fined by the Financial Ombudsman for failing to do its job correctly.....AGAIN
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