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Compliance Corner: FMA
Editorial Staff
10 April 2019
Financial Markets Authority (New Zealand) Talbot was virtual CFO of VMob from 2011 until 2014. Following a referral from the NZX in September 2014, the FMA started to probe potential insider trading. The investigation related to the purchase of VMob shares shortly before an announcement that VMob had been awarded a contract with McDonald’s Japan, projected to yield significant revenue for the company, FMA said in a statement. Talbot entered a guilty plea to one representative charge of failing to disclose a relevant interest, admitted a breach of the Securities Markets Act 1988 (SMA) and was given an enforceable undertaking which has been accepted by the FMA in accordance with sections 46 and 46A of the Financial Markets Authority Act 2011 (FMA Act), the regulator said.
The FMA said Mark Stephen Talbot, a former virtual chief financial officer of VMob (now Plexure) will pay NZ$150,000 ($101,200) in lieu of a penalty, and banned him from acting as a director or manager of a listed business for five years. He admitted insider dealing, entering a guilty plea on a representative charge for a breach of disclosure obligations at Auckland High Court last month.