Former financial adviser sentenced to 3-year intensive correctional order

In a statement on Monday, the corporate regulator confirmed Ezzat-Daniel Nesseim has been sentenced to a three-year intensive correctional order, including one year of home detention, for engaging in dishonest conduct and providing falsified documents to ASIC.

According to ASIC, between 16 August and 11 October 2017, Mr Nesseim engaged in repeated dishonest conduct, by providing three, forged wholesale client certificates to ASIC in an attempt to influence the regulator’s decision on an investigation and by knowingly giving the regulator false answers and information when questioned about the forged certificates.

Moreover, Mr Nesseim allegedly made use of other fabricated evidence, including doctored emails and purported witness statements in a hearing before an ASIC delegate, where he also gave false testimony under oath.

“Instead of showing the honesty and integrity required of someone who works in the financial services sector, Mr Nesseim deliberately lied to ASIC, using fabricated evidence and lied under oath in an attempt to evade ASIC’s scrutiny,” said ASIC deputy chair Sarah Court.

“Where ASIC suspects someone has deliberately lied to us, either directly or by providing us with false documents, we will not hesitate to refer them for prosecution.”

Upon sentencing, Judge McGrath said that Mr Nesseim had “weaved a tangled web; and ultimately entangled himself in his own falsehoods”.

“Had he admitted non-compliance with the particular disclosure requirements when first contacted, the consequences for him would not have involved a protracted investigation, compulsory hearings, strike-off and criminal prosecution for serious offences.”

Mr Nesseim is currently the general manager of Accord Partners, a business operated by Foresight Enterprises, of which he is the sole director. At the time of the offending, he ran a financial services business called Smart Financial Strategies. 

ASIC confirmed that as a result of his conviction, Mr Nesseim has been automatically disqualified from managing corporations for a period of five years from the date of his conviction.