The Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) has sided with a client, who alleged that Chartered firm bdhSterling had provided unsuitable advice to invest a pension fund into an unregulated investment which then lost all its value.
The complaint stems from an investment manager of a venture capital business, Mr I, who sought greater returns on one of his pensions plans worth about £130,000. In 2012, his bdhSterling adviser recommended transferring the plan into a self-invested personal pension (SIPP), to facilitate an unregulated investment of £123,000 into Brazilian timber plantations via Global Forestry Investments (GFI). A fact find from a 2008 found he was on a salary of £170,000, had a house worth about £1m without a mortgage as well as a second property abroad worth £250,000. The client also had investments i...
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