Newbridge Fined $500,000 for Not Supervising Pennsylvania Broker
The Pennsylvania Department of Banking and Securities has fined Newbridge Securities Corporation $499,000 for failing to supervise one Pennsylvania broker that sold structured products to his clients in the state.
According to the order, from January 2012 to December 2016, the brokerage firm allegedly failed to maintain a reasonable system for applying and enforcing written procedures in connection with the structured product sales.
No other details were provided by the regulators on the type of investment or how much was sold, and Newbridge signed the order without admitting or denying the findings.
Although the broker was not named in the legal documents, FINRA records show that Austin Dutton of Bridge Valley Financial Services, an affiliate of Newbridge Securities, is the firm’s Pennsylvania agent.
According to a 2014 interview with the Philadelphia Inquirer, Dutton was outspoken in his methods of marketing and selling American Realty Capital investments to police officers, firefighters, teachers, and retirees.
Newbridge Financial was one of seven broker-dealers fined by Massachusetts’ securities regulators last year in connection with the Realty Capital Securities proxy fraud scandal that shuttered the firm in December 2015. Realty Capital Securities was the wholesaling broker-dealer of American Realty Capital, now known as AR Global.
