The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority fined J.P. Morgan an additional $200,000 for failing to reasonably supervise a broker who made unsuitable, unauthorized trades in his grandmother's account with the firm.
From March 2014 through March 2019, Evan Schottenstein, along with his brother, Avi Schottenstein, another rep at the firm, allegedly made the trades in question, which were largely in structured products, according to FINRA.
During that period, Evan Schottenstein was responsible for his grandmother's investment strategy and made all trade recommendations for her account, FINRA said. At the time, the grandmother was 88 years old, retired and widowed, according to FINRA.
Evan Schottenstein filled his grandmother's account with structured products, exceeding his firm's limits for such investments, FINRA said. The firm used an exception report that generated monthly alerts when structured products exceeded a 50% threshold for a client's net account equity and a 15% threshold for a client's liquid net worth, FINRA noted.
However, from May 2014 through May 2015, Evan Schottenstein bought over $108 million in securities for his grandmother, including $77 million in structured notes. On May 21, 2015, the firm placed restrictions on how many structured products could be traded in her account. But those restrictions were ignored and, by 2019, structured notes in her account realized losses of $5.5 million, FINRA said.
Evan Schottenstein also created an email account in his grandmother's name in 2014 despite the fact that she didn't use email or own a computer and he forged her signature on a $5 million private equity investment in 2018, FINRA alleged.
JPM failed to take reasonable actions to investigate and address" Evan Schottenstein's "misconduct, despite the presence of red flags," FINRA said in a letter of acceptance, waiver and consent.
