Finra bars former Northwestern rep for impersonating customers

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. has barred a former Northwestern Mutual broker over a scheme that involved impersonating investors and creating accounts away from his firm. According to Finra and details supplied by Northwestern Mutual on BrokerCheck, from November 2015 through April 2, 2017, Matthew Cochran of Charlotte, N.C., and his father, who is not a broker, used their discretion to execute transactions in 94 accounts held at TD Ameritrade. Finra said that Mr. Cochran opened these accounts, held by 98 of his customers, without informing Northwestern or TD Ameritrade of what he was doing. When Mr. Cochran and his father opened the online accounts at TD Ameritrade, Finra said the two kept the customers' user names and passwords. They used this access to trade options and other securities, based on verbal — but not written — discretion given to Mr. Cochran. In 10 telephone calls to the executing firm, Mr. Cochran impersonated the account holders and instructed the firm to liquidate their positions. Finra said that Mr. Cochran and his father executed 5,931 transactions with an aggregate value of more than$9.6 million for the investors with accounts at TD Ameritrade. Mr. Cochran received $34,000 related to this activity from his customers. On April 12, 2017, Northwestern Mutual permitted Mr. Cochran "to resign after he admitted to engaging in private securities transactions, selling away from the firm, collecting and storing confidential information on an unsecured spreadsheet and avoiding documentation to evade supervision of these activities." While not now registered with a Finra firm, Mr. Cochran describes himself as a self-employed "Independent Financial Consultant" on his LinkedIn page.