A Tasmanian former financial adviser who was previously banned by the national corporate regulator for using his clients' funds to settle debts with the real-life "Wolf of Wall Street" has been convicted for using false documents to obtain a financial advantage.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) reports that between July 2013 and April 2014 Ashley Grant Howard used false off-market transfer forms to transfer shares in a number of companies to himself and an associate.
Those companies were GPS Alliance Holdings Limited, BHP Billiton Limited and Aquarius Platinum Limited.
The 14 owners of the shares did not authorise the transfers and were unaware of them.
Earlier this year, Mr Howard pleaded guilty to two counts of using false documents to obtain a financial advantage or disadvantage.
On Tuesday, the Hobart man was sentenced in Sydney's Downing Centre Local Court to a 12-month Community Corrections order.
Mr Howard has been unable to work as a financial adviser since October 2016 when he was permanently banned by ASIC for matters unrelated to the court case.
The corporate regulator found he had used more than $1.8 million of clients' funds for his own benefit or the benefit of others.
This included paying for cosmetic surgery for his partner, purchasing a house and settling debts to Jordan Belfort — the wall street trader whose biography inspired Martin Scorsese's 2013 film The Wolf of Wall Street.
At the time, ASIC said in a public statement that its investigation had revealed Mr Howard "engaged in dishonest conduct, provided financial services when not licensed or authorised to do so and engaged in conduct that likely to mislead".
ASIC said his "dishonest unauthorised use of the $1.8 million from clients" meant that he was not of "good fame and character".
"ASIC will take action to remove persons from the financial services industry to protect the public," said then-ASIC Commissioner John Price in 2016.
"Mr Howard's conduct was particularly bad in that, on occasions, he preyed on elderly and vulnerable people."
