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(December 11, 2007) The founder and former president of Norbourg Asset Management, has been convicted of 51 counts of fraud in a Montreal court.

Vincent Lacroix was accused by l’Autorite des marches financiers (AMF) of making 134 “irregular” withdrawals from the fund he operated, totalling $115 million.

In handing down the verdict, Quebec court Judge Claude Leblond said that Lacroix’s fraud had affected more than 9,200 investors. Receiver Ernst & Young has recovered about $75 million, distributing $31.7 million to a group of 5,600 investors in June 2006.

Norbourg was shut down by the AMF in August, 2005, as the regulator investigated allegations that $130 million had gone missing.

Lacroix could face a prison term of five years less a day and a fine of $1 million for each of the 51 charges.

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IDA raps two for stock scam

(December 11, 2007) The IDA has found Jeffrey Bradford Kasman and Clinton Anderson guilty of violating bylaw 29.1, which forbids “conduct unbecoming or detrimental to the public interest.”

A hearing panel found that the pair had facilitated manipulative and/or deceptive trading in the shares of a Pink Sheets-listed stock between January 30, 2003, and April 30, 2003. During that period, three offshore clients of Kasman and Anderson accounted for 76% of the trading volume of the stock.

Trades between the three accounts drove the price higher on 41 occasions, and were placed “within minutes or even seconds of each other.”

“Although Mr. Kasman and Mr. Anderson were unthinking and unaware of the significance of the trading in question, their failure to make appropriate inquiries in the circumstances was ‘conduct falling far below that required and expected of a registered representative,’ ” the IDA said in a release.

Penalties will be imposed at a hearing on February 6, 2008. At all times, Kasman and Anderson were approved persons at the Toronto branch office of Desjardins Securities. They are both currently registered representatives at the Toronto office of Research Capital.

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PIP adopts Univeris platform

(December 11, 2007) Partners in Planning Financial Group has selected Univeris’s Enterprise Wealth Management System to administer its mutual fund and segregated fund business.

“It was critical that Partners in Planning’s financial advisors, with their reputation for excellence in financial planning, have the best advisor solution to enable its strong commitment to customer service excellence, and the Univeris EWMS wealth platform will clearly make this happen,” says Hugh Gabruch, COO, Partners in Planning. “We required an innovative wealth management solution to drive our market growth strategy, and the Univeris EWMS wealth platform is the best solution to help us achieve this.”

The move will put over 600 advisors onto the EWMS platform, which integrates all client, portfolio and investment information.

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Connor, Clark & Lunn seek fund merger

(December 11, 2007) The board of directors of Connor, Clark & Lunn Capital Markets Inc. has approved a proposal to merge the company’s Global Financials Fund and Global Financials Fund II.

The two funds have the same mandate and are both managed by New Star Asset Management Limited. The merger should cut costs for investors, and will increase the fund’s liquidity and market cap.

Investors in GF1 will be given warrants for GF2, which will continue to trade. Special meetings of unitholders of GF1 and GF2 have been called and will be held on January 17, 2008, to vote on the proposal.

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CFA Institute promotes Johnson

(December 11, 2007) The CFA Institute has named Robert R. Johnson as deputy CEO, a newly created position reporting to CEO Jeff Diermeier.

Johnson will continue to lead the CFA Institute’s education division, and will manage the association’s professional ethics initiatives. Johnson joined CFA Institute in September 1996 as a vice-president responsible for the curriculum process of the CFA program.

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UBS doubles KeyClient Group

(December 11, 2007) Competition for high-net-worth clients is about to get a little tougher, as UBS has announced that it is expanding its Canadian KeyClient Group.

The expansion doubles the number of KeyClient advisors across the country, from four to eight, with offices in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto and Montreal.

“Despite the volatility in the markets, we have seen the Canadian economy generate a great deal of sustained wealth over the past 10 years,” says Grant Rasmussen, head of UBS’s wealth management division in Canada. “Recent surveys have shown that the number of wealthy Canadians is increasing, so you really do need a focused strategy for this market.”

The group provides a comprehensive suite of wealth management services to Canadians with investible assets of more than $50 million. What does “comprehensive” mean? Aside from investment strategies, clients have access to aircraft financing, wine banking, art banking and non-traditional asset classes.

“KeyClients tend to approach us as much for professional advice relating to their family situation, such as family governance issues and philanthropy strategies, as they do investment solutions,” said Sam Sivarajan, head of the Canadian KeyClient Group. “We now have a steady stream of UBS global experts working with our Canadian clients to provide the specialized counsel and strategies that these wealthy Canadians are looking for.”

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Sprott to launch new hedge fund

(December 11, 2007) Sprott Asset Management has announced the launch of the Sprott Global Market Neutral Fund, which will be made available to investors on February 1, 2008.

The primary objective of the fund will be to provide long-term capital appreciation by investing in long and short positions in equity and equity-related securities of companies, in a neutral approach. It will invest in medium to large capitalization companies with a relative change in fundamental factors anywhere in the world.

(12/11/07)