Huntington Investment Company Broker Named in FINRA Complaint Alleging Unsuitable UIT Recommendations
David Michael Miller, a former registered representative with Huntington Investment Company (Huntington) was named a respondent in a Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) complaint alleging unsuitable Unit Investment Trust (UIT) recommendations. The complaint alleges that Mr. Miller, of Columbus, Ohio, had no reasonable basis to recommend UIT purchases which totaled approximately $5.4 million in 129 customer accounts. Further, the complaint alleges that Mr. Miller failed to exercise the necessary due diligence with respect to the UIT recommendations. Specifically, the complaint states that Mr. Miller allegedly did not read the prospectuses, did not know that the underlying closed-end funds were leveraged, and did not know that certain of the closed-end funds invested in junk bonds and that the UIT prospectuses advised that investing in such bonds should be viewed as speculative and subject to numerous risks, including higher interest rates, economic recession, possible downgrades, and defaults of interest and/or principal. The complaint further alleges that Mr. Miller negligently misrepresented and omitted material facts to customers in connection with their UIT purchases totaling $964,000. Also, Mr. Miller allegedly misrepresented to this particular customer that the UIT investment was “safe,” and that if the customer hold the investment until termination of the trust, he would receive his entire principal investment plus the 5% interest payment received during the term of the trust.
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