Laverty was named a respondent in a FINRA complaint alleging that that during consecutive associations with several member firms, he borrowed $1,350,000 from an elderly married couple in violation of each firm’s policies. The complaint alleges that three of the firms prohibited their representatives from borrowing money from their customers.
Although a firm permitted loans between representatives and customers under limited circumstances, any such loan required the written approval of the chief compliance officer. The firm’s chief compliance officer never provided any such approval to Laverty. The complaint also alleges that Laverty concealed the loans from his firms and falsely stated on annual compliance questionnaires and on a heightened supervision attestation that he had not borrowed money from customers. For an example, Laverty lied on a firm’s compliance questionnaires concerning soliciting or accepting a loan from or making a loan to a client and having a judgment against him. On a firm’s annual compliance questionnaire, Laverty’s answers were false because earlier he had borrowed $45,000 from the elderly couple. Moreover, the Superior Court of California, County of Riverside, entered a judgment against Laverty for $114,456.25 in a lawsuit by the Security Bank of California against him arising from his failure to repay a promissory note. Laverty was aware of this judgment.
The complaint further alleges that Laverty concealed the loans from FINRA and provided false on-the-record (OTR) testimony during a previous FINRA investigation into his borrowing activity. During an OTR taken in that investigation, FINRA questioned Laverty about loans from five particular customers, and then asked, “Mr. Laverty, did you borrow from any other customers?” Laverty answered, “No” and insisted that he had only borrowed from these five customers. Laverty’s answers were false. Laverty had, in fact, also borrowed from the elderly couple. In addition, Laverty executed a $1.4 million promissory note for the loans that the elderly couple had extended to him and quickly breached the agreement by making none of the required monthly payments. The elderly couple filed a Statement of Claim against Laverty and the firms through which he registered. One of the firms filed a Form U5 Amendment disclosing the Statement of Claim and informing FINRA, for the first time, that Laverty had improperly solicited and accepted loans from the elderly couple. Neither of these elderly customers lived to see their claims resolved. Nevertheless, days before a scheduled arbitration, the elderly couple, through their successor in interest, settled their claim against Laverty. Soon thereafter, Laverty breached his obligations under the settlement by failing to make a required payment. FINRA suspended Laverty for failure to comply with the settlement. In addition, the complaint alleges that Laverty willfully failed to update his Form U4 to disclose an unsatisfied judgment entered in the Security Bank of California lawsuit and a federal tax lien.