The chief executive of DF Mainland Securities, John White, has been cleared to apply again for associate membership of the New Zealand Stock Exchange.
After four years of legal wrang-ling, the Court of Appeal at Wellington yesterday overturned the Stock Exchange's decision to refuse him membership in 1997.
The court said the exchange's membership appeal committee decision on Mr White's application also could not remain because it appeared to defer to the exchange's original view rather than considering Mr White's application afresh.
The Stock Exchange should have given Mr White a chance to respond to an objection to his membership and two letters questioning his fitness for membership.
In 1987, Mr White falsely claimed to have taped a phone conversation about buying shares for a client, and then fabricated a transcript of the conversation.
In a later civil case trying to recover the share purchase price, a High Court judge said Mr White had committed a deliberate fraud.
After the Stock Exchange decision Mr White swore an affidavit saying he had kept up the "bluff" about the phone conversation tape and transcript with the approval of his then immediate senior colleague, and later with the approval of a lawyer.
The Court of Appeal said Mr White could make a fresh application for exchange membership or pursue his existing application.
It awarded him costs of $5000 for the Court of Appeal hearing.
- NZPA
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