ASIC bans GC financial adviser

Hobart-based Anthony Silver has been sentenced to eight years and six month’s imprisonment for fraud totalling $1.8 million, following an investigation by the corporate regulator.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) said Mr Silver, who was the shadow director of scheme companies Capital Growth International Club and All About Property Development, misappropriated $1.8 million of the $9 million collected from investors between 2008 and 2010.

The corporate regulator said Mr Silver had transferred investors’ funds to his personal bank account, making payments to company employees and paying returns to other investors.

Mr Silver pleaded guilty to the allegations.

ASIC found that many of the investors were pensioners and were approached to invest in the scheme companies by cold-call telemarketing or word of mouth.

Investors were promised that their funds would either be allocated towards the development of Tasmanian properties or pooled and invested in bank term deposits, with a guaranteed return of 15–20 per cent annually. Some investors were even persuaded to take out loans against their homes to participate in the scheme.

In delivering the sentence, Judge Vicki Loury KC remarked on the significant impact of Mr Silver’s fraud on the victims and the financial and psychological cost to them.

The court set Mr Silver a non-parole period of two and a half years.

In 2019, Mr Silver’s son, Bradley Silver, was sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment after pleading guilty to dishonesty offences relating to the scheme companies totalling over $4.7 million.

Moreover, in 2017, former Westpac home finance manager David St Pierre was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment after pleading guilty to dishonest use of his position concerning his role in submitting false loan applications to obtain over $2.5 million for Westpac customers to invest in the scheme companies.

Finfluencer hit with permanent injunctions

Meanwhile, the Federal Court recently made permanent injunctions against social media finfluencer Tyson Robert Scholz, prohibiting him from carrying on a financial services business in Australia in contravention of the Corporations Act.

Following its finding in December that Mr Scholz had contravened s 911A of the Corporations Act by carrying on a financial service business without an Australian Financial Services Licence, the Federal Court has now permanently prohibited Mr Scholz from hosting online groups for which a membership fee is charged without an AFSL and carrying on a financial services business in Australia.

[Related: Finfluencer hit with permanent injunctions]