SVS Securities - shut down?

My2penneth

Dividends
One can see from the Phoenix screenshot that all dividends in accruals ("pending") are clearly noted with all the info one would expect (company, XD, pay date, qty, amount).

What is missing in the information on dividends received between 23rd July handover from LC and the subsequent migration of shares onto Phoenix. Once shares are migrated onto Phoenix, dividend issues I think would be resolved. It's just that interim period where we haven't a clue what dividends have been captured.

My2penneth

If one runs the Report "MTM" , it lists out shares in your accounts and when they were added, It shows that ITI have been adding shares in batches (which is what I suspected). 

johnburman

My2penneth said:

If one runs the Report "MTM" , it lists out shares in your accounts and when they were added, It shows that ITI have been adding shares in batches (which is what I suspected). 

Which means that the "valuations" give to the new brokers pending a transfer to them will be wrong.  Hence the delay by ITI in completing the transfer.  But howm much longer do we have to wait?

My2penneth

If you combine the Qort + Phoenix accounts,  then you should hopefully have a "full set" of your shareholdings.  The ones that can't be migrated to Phoenix being held in the holding account.  

Geeba

My broker is AJ Bell and today has seen some positive headway regarding my transfers (1 ISA and 1 dealing; both initiated by the broker on the 5th Aug and 13th Aug respectively).  Yesterday they confirmed by email that they have arranged Trade and Settlement dates of my assets for the 18th and 21st September respectively.

Today both my accounts have been credited with the stocks that respectively appear in my ITI Qort accounts.  Currently no transfer of the stocks moved from Qort to the Phoenix accounts, but I suspect that could be more complicated given the ability to actively trade those stocks with ITI (which I've not done to avoid muddying the waters). And no cash components have been transferred yet.

Not that I currently intend to but I've checked to see if I can sell any of the transferred stocks via AJ but can not and I suspect that is a restriction in place until the entire transfer is complete and agreed, but at least there is unbelievable progress!

Hope this brings some relief to you all that there may be a glimmer of light at the end of the very long and very dark tunnel!

Of course I may have become delusional and am dreaming all of this, but so far all of the pinching is actually painful! ;-) 

toad333

My2penneth said:

toad333 said:

Hi guys

I’m an overseas client. Was open-minded about ITI, but have now opened an account with Interactive Brokers in the US. No cheap options for British expats in the U.K.

I think I will sell everything and transfer the cash to Interactive Brokers. Not sure if they transfer to accounts
outside the U.K.

And still waiting for access to my account! 

If you go to the IB website you can log on to your ITI Phoenix account....so why not simply ask ITI to transfer you free of charge to IB?

Cheers for that information. Still don’t have a Phoenix account yet. Uploaded required documents over a week ago. 

I have some boohoo shares, which I think are AIM. Am I right in thinking these can’t be traded on Phoenix?

shawdon

A bit more pressure being applied by ShareSoC today:
 Mark Bentley wrote:

 I have not had a meaningful response to my email to ITI, other than an acknowledgement, promise to revert with a proper response and a request not to copy the FCA in! I shall ignore the latter request - glad I've touched a nerve.

 I have send a chasing email today, saying:

 I am disappointed not to have heard anything further from you about this matter. The SVS clients continue to be very frustrated and annoyed about the lack of communication from ITI.

 In the absence of a reasonably prompt response to their concerns, ShareSoc will have to consider what further action can be taken to obtain a satisfactory resolution.

 In the absence of a response early next week, my step will be to contact the FCA directly to get their suggestions on how this can be resolved. In the absence of a satisfactory response from them, the next step will be to pursue parliamentary and press channels to increase the pressure on the FCA to act.

Jamesram

shawdon said:

A bit more pressure being applied by ShareSoC today:
 Mark Bentley wrote:

 I have not had a meaningful response to my email to ITI, other than an acknowledgement, promise to revert with a proper response and a request not to copy the FCA in! I shall ignore the latter request - glad I've touched a nerve.

 I have send a chasing email today, saying:

 I am disappointed not to have heard anything further from you about this matter. The SVS clients continue to be very frustrated and annoyed about the lack of communication from ITI.

 In the absence of a reasonably prompt response to their concerns, ShareSoc will have to consider what further action can be taken to obtain a satisfactory resolution.

 In the absence of a response early next week, my step will be to contact the FCA directly to get their suggestions on how this can be resolved. In the absence of a satisfactory response from them, the next step will be to pursue parliamentary and press channels to increase the pressure on the FCA to act.

Thanks Mark Bentley and thanks Shawdon - last para = way to go!

rnf11

 Mark Bentley wrote:

 I have not had a meaningful response to my email to ITI, other than an acknowledgement, promise to revert with a proper response and a request not to copy the FCA in! I shall ignore the latter request - glad I've touched a nerve.

Hmm. Have, by any chance, the FCA already begun to hassle ITIC?

rnf11

This appeared in the online version of CITY AM this morning:-

Friday 18 September 2020 6:00 am      The lacklustre FCA is in desperate need of regulatory oversight.

                    The FCA has a legacy of incompetence, argues Philip Sinel

It is unlikely that Juvenal, the first century Roman poet, had the Financial Conduct Authority in mind when he famously asked: “Who guards the guards?”
A slew of depressingly similar scandals have, however, brought the question of regulatory oversight into sharp relief. Indeed, such has been the extent of the FCA’s negligence and downright incompetence that it seems the regulator has, in secret, launched a campaign to get itself abolished.
After all, within the space of a week in August, the FCA was strongly criticised by Dame Elizabeth Gloster for failing to make any headway in the investigation into the causes of the London Capital & Finance scandal before latterly announcing that it intends to cap the compensation it pays out even when its actions are identified as “the chief cause of loss”. It would seem that the guards are refusing to let themselves be guarded.

Incidents such as these are far from being isolated. The Tomlinson Report in 2013, for instance, found that even whilst RBS was clearly and “systematically abusing customers,” the FCA did nothing. No action was brought after HBOS committed its jaw-dropping frauds.

Lacklustre regulation
But perhaps the clearest example is the PPI scandal. Flagrant misselling was an open secret: stories of banks jacking up the interest on loans sold without PPI abounded. The then FSA knew full well what was taking place right under its nose and did nothing, beyond issuing a lacklustre report in 2005 noting poor selling practices and lack of compliance controls.
Of course, the mis-selling continued and the first fine was not issued until 2007, and even then these only targeted smaller institutions such as Alliance & Leicester, which lost a desultory £7m in fines from an estimated PPI income of £135m.
Eventually, a further two years later, PPI was banned, but not before individuals lost huge sums in one of the worst banking scandals in living memory. But it was not swift, clear-sighted action from the regulator that did it for PPI. Rather, the rise of claims companies that spurred individuals to seek out redress in such huge numbers that the regulator had to act.

The FSA has since evolved into the FCA, but it is clear that incompetence runs in the family. In fact, if *Antony Townsend, the UK Complaints Commissioner, is to be believed, the FCA’s failure to take action for six months after news of investors being defrauded came to light is a sure sign that it has a ‘lack of curiosity or sense of urgency’. In other jurisdictions such words might be terminal, but not here.

FCA does not live up to the City

Our present state of affairs should be a cause of alarm. The City – the alleged envy of the world – is barely regulated and all too often allowed to run riot. This is not because we lack the resources or the ability to properly police the sector, but because the regulator all too often works hand-in-glove with banks and political interests.
Thus, it is a predictable absurdity that the government’s Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan scheme advisor is a Conservative Party donor. Ours is a revolving door system, where a procession of Treasury permanent secretaries – Lord Burns, Sir Peter Middleton and Lord Macpherson, to name a few – stroll out of Whitehall and into plum City jobs.
Such a situation does not lead to effective regulation and swift action against wrong doing. The City may be a modern wonder of the world, but its regulator appears to have been drawn from a banana republic.

It is long overdue that we sought to guard the guards. When the regulator fails, as it so often does, the government must step in: individuals who preside over myriad instances of regulatory incompetence must not become the governor of the central bank, for instance.
   
We need a regulator that is transparent and accountable, where compensation is not capped simply because it is easier than regulating, and where individuals are empowered to secure redress not just from banks, but also from the regulators themselves. It is not that such steps cannot be taken, but that powerful interest groups prevail to step these being taken.

Or perhaps the FCA is indeed trying to get itself abolished.

Philip Sinel is a senior partner at Sinels

City A.M.'s opinion pages are a place for thought-provoking views and debate. These views are not necessarily shared by City A.M.

Share: duly done!

* Is Antony Townsend, the UK Complaints Commissioner someone else whose doors we could usefully darken icw all the LC/ICIT/FCA shortcomings?