FINRA Fines And Suspends UBS Financial Advisor, Richard D. Niemann, For Exercising Discretion In Customer Accounts Without Authorization
Richard D. Niemann is currently a Financial Advisor at UBS Financial Services Inc. in its Sugar Land, Texas branch office. Richard Niemann has been in the securities industry since 1971, and previously worked at Merrill Lynch, Lehman Brothers and Salomon Smith Barney.
According to publicly available records released by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), on March 11, 2019, Richard Niemann entered into a letter of acceptance, waiver and consent ("AWC") with FINRA, agreeing to a fine of $5,000 and suspension. The AWC states that "from June 2010 through November 2017, Niemann exercised discretion without written authorization in 13 accounts belonging to 11 customers, in violation of NASD Rule 2510(b) and FINRA Rule 2010.
For a copy of the FINRA sanction, click http://www.finra.org/sites/default/files/fda_documents/2018057927801%20Richard%20D.%20Niemann%20CRD%20348144%20AWC%20va.pdf
Separately, Richard Niemann has four customer disputes disclosed on his BrokerCheck, including two complaints concerning auction rate securities. One settled for $75,000, while the other settled for $575,000.
For a copy of the Richard Niemann CRD, click https://brokercheck.finra.org/individual/summary/348144#disclosuresSection
In addition, unauthorized trading is a serious allegation based upon a belief that the customer did not approve the purchase or sale of a security prior to execution of the trade. Financial Advisors who engage in unauthorized trading often do so to increase commissions earned from their clients' accounts.