The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has fined and suspended a former professional football player turned broker in Short Hills, New Jersey over a list of alleged infractions including mismarking trades and lying to compliance personnel.
William D. Ard, who was a guard on the New York Giants team that won the Super Bowl in 1987 and went on to become a broker at Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, accepted a four-month suspension and $15,000 fine without admitting or denying Finra’s allegations, according to a letter of settlement finalized September 22.
The violations trace back to 2018 when Ard, who was registered as a broker for 38 years, allegedly forwarded an email to a customer that contained misleading information about investing in a publicly traded biopharmaceutical company.
The email predicted that the company’s stock price would hold its position and rise under even “the worst-case scenarios” and contained “unwarranted” statements that the company could be acquired at an “‘outrageous[ly]’ high price,” according to Finra. Ard thus violated Finra Rule 2210 which prohibits brokers from making false or exaggerated claims, according to the letter.
Separately, in 2020, Ard gave an “intentionally false” answer to a Morgan Stanley compliance official investigating how one of his customers was using funds from a liquidity access line of credit drawn against his portfolio, according to the settlement.
Ard told the official that he did not know how the funds were...
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