Five years’ jail for Bell Potter SMSF adviser

Glen Russell Evans, former director of the deregistered Kismet Trading and adviser at Bell Potter Securities, received the five-year sentence with a three-year non-parole period, after pleading guilty to 10 counts of failing to account in the Sydney District Court.

An Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) investigation previously found that Evans, when engaged as an adviser to SMSF trustees for the purposes of investing in Australian equities and derivatives, had provided false trading and performance reports, had failed to invest money as agreed and to repay the balance to aggrieved investors, and had used his clients’ money as collateral for his personal trading account.

“As this outcome shows, we will not hesitate to take action to remove bad apples from the industry to ensure confidence in the financial services space remains strong,” said ASIC commissioner Greg Tanzer, in a statement responding to the sentence.

The case follows the two-year suspended sentence handed down to former Bell Potter colleague Lawson Stuart Donald in April for dishonest conduct.