Mr Johnson faces a maximum of ten years’ imprisonment for each of the state offences of false accounting, theft and deception and a term of five years imprisonment for submitting a false document to ASIC.

Mr Johnson, 41, of Toorak, Victoria, has pleaded guilty to:

• three charges of false accounting;
• one charge of submitting a false document to ASIC;
• two charges of theft to the value of $742,641; and
• one charge of obtaining a financial advantage by deception

The charges relate to the use of various Sonray client’s trading accounts to create numerous unfunded deposits for which no physical cash was involved. This was done to either obtain funds for use by himself or Sonray, or to hedge the trading book against margin calls. The effect of withdrawing funds from client accounts from unfunded deposit entries caused an actual deficiency in the segregated client account funds.

Additionally, Mr Johnson, in a solvency report required by ASIC, made a false statement about equity injections of $5.2m into Sonray.

ASIC Commissioner Greg Tanzer said “ASIC expects directors to act honestly and with integrity, and always in the interests of the company. We take very seriously conduct to the contrary, and the charges that Mr. Johnson has pleaded guilty to today reflect that.

The integrity of the market is one of ASIC’s key priorities, and investors have a fundamental right to expect that their money will be handled honestly and appropriately. Where this does not occur, ASIC will not hesitate to take action to protect the interests of the clients.”

Mr Johnson was granted bail and will appear at the Supreme Court on 11 November, 2013 for a sentence hearing, on conditions that he;

• inform the court of any change to his residential address;
• surrender his passport and not attend any international port of departure; and
• not contact any prosecution witness

The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions is prosecuting the matter.

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Appearing in the Sydney District Court, Mr Veitch, formerly of Minto, New South Wales, pleaded guilty to 22 counts of using a false instrument.

Mr Veitch was an authorised representative of WealthSure Pty Ltd from 14 December 2005 to 23 February 2010. During this time, Mr Veitch admitted to:

21 counts of using false withdrawal requests to cause the fraudulent transfer of approximately $500,000 from seven clients’ accounts without their knowledge or authority for his own purposes, and
one count of providing a client with a false portfolio statement causing the client to believe that $300,000 was still in their account when in fact it was not.

These charges follow ASIC’s investigation into Mr Veitch’s former role as a financial adviser.

The matter will return to the Sydney District Court on 8 November 2013, with conditional bail to continue.

The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions is prosecuting this matter.

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