According to our old friend pboyles, to have simply worked briefly for an entity taints someone - and all their subsequent employers - for evermore. (G-d help those who work - or have worked - for the likes of Enron, Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) Barclays, RBS, etc ,etc....)
Its rather different when the entire business model of the firm in the cases of PacCon, Square Mile, Blue Index revolved around ripping people off... Its not some bad apples in a huge company who had a big impact etc... but rather entire firms who were set up simply to fleece people. PacCon and Square Mile were basically penny share spank shops mostly flogging AIM cash shells - if you were to check the motley fool forums there are countless stories of innocent investors getting cold called by these chavs in suits.
Blue Index was quite clearly set up to simply churn accounts... the transaction costs alone make it nearly impossible for the clients to do well in the long term - again same dodgy sales types running the place....
It is disappointing he has stooped to naming innocent and decent people - all of whom have unblemished reputations - on this website. This is compounded by Steve Anderton's apparent tacit support, allowing these nasty and unfounded claims to be made with impunity.
Pointing out the fact that some people worked for scummy firms when the information is freely available on the FSA's website isn't nasty or unfounded at all. People can draw their own inferences as to the type of people who'd chose to work at firms that were actively destroying the investments of ordinary people.
This forum exists for people to share information about trading, about software vendors about brokers etc.. to criticise someone for sharing some information that could be viewed negatively kind of misses the point.
I actually found it quite interesting to have a look at your firm on the FSA register.
Currently you seem to have a grand total of nine people on there - is one of them you by any chance?
Of those nine people four of them seem to have just joined your firm within the last three years and have no prior experience in a regulated role. Presumably these are just junior guys....
The other five, presumably the more senior ones(?), contain the interesting histories.
You've got two directors who've not been in a regulated role at another firm:
FSA Register
FSA Register
I'd say given the below three's previous employers this is likely a good thing.
As has already been pointed out - you've got the spectacularly unlucky Sarbjit Satpal Chahal who's managed to get Paccon, Square Mile, First Trade, Bridge Hall and Astor on his record.... apparently he's a vice president at your firm?
https://www.fsa.gov.uk/register/indivHistory.do?sid=595910
You've got Gregory 'Rupert' Nathan who previously worked for HB Markets aka Hoodless Brennan
Ironically he has the following controlled function amongst others:
CF10 Compliance Oversight
FSA Register
And you've got Tomas Christopher Nugent
With Wills & Co and Blue Index on his record:
FSA Register
So just to recap... grand total of nine approved persons - four of them are relatively new guys and three of the others have worked for, and this is an understatement, rather 'questionable' firms.....
Looking at the inactive guys doesn't paint a great picture either... more than nine of these and flicking through the names it seems to have been quite common for people to have been on the FSA register for your firm and then to pop up again.... ........no where.
Surely with the amazing returns you guys have published on your website plenty of firms in the city would be actively trying to recruit anyone who'd worked at your place.... for some odd reason it doesn't appear to be the case.
I repeat my earlier invitation to ANYONE who has any concerns to contact me directly.
Why would anyone feel the need to do that... a forum is a perfectly legitimate and open means of communication. Personally after just doing some very basic checking up on your firm I wouldn't have any reason to call you at all.
Your website itself is very disconcerting... you're claiming returns which haven't been audited and where you throw in the caveat that transaction costs haven't been taken into account when calculating them..... wonder why that is.... :whistling
