Sebi on Thursday barred F6 Finserve, F6 Commodities and four persons from the securities markets for five years in a case pertaining to mis-utilisation of client funds and securities.
In addition, they have been asked to refund the investors' money, along with interest.
Apart from F6 Finserve, F6 Commodities, those banned by Sebi are Pankaj Goel, Meenu Goel, Deepak Goel and Ruchika Goel.
In its order, Sebi observed that F6 Finserve and F6 Commodities are connected with each other on the basis of same registered office and common promoter-directors -- Pankaj Goel and Meenu Goel. While Deepak and Ruchika were former directors at F6 Finserve.
''I observe that the information and data gathered at the time of inspection unequivocally bring to light the various flagrant lapses noticed from the way both F6 Finserve and F6 Commodities were operating their broking operations and managing their clients' funds and securities.
''Further, the violations committed by F6 Finserve and F6 Commodities are undoubtedly grave in nature which have been carried out for a considerable period of time (almost 2 years),'' Sebi whole-time member S K Mohanty said in his order.
According to Sebi, F6 Finserve failed in its duty to correctly report the margins collected by it from its clients to the exchange, had not settled funds aggregating to Rs 1.43 crore of 891 clients who had not traded during the period, January to March 2017, and failed to redress investors' grievances.
''F6 Commodities has visibly aided and abetted F6 Finserve in misutilising its clients' funds,'' the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) found.
In addition, F6 Finserve transferred the funds of one client to the other or to its promoter-director, as per its own convenience, without paying any heed to its obligation to maintain separate accounts for its client and for itself (proprietary account).
Also, it indulged in activities wherein the securities received from one client were noticed to have been transferred by the stock broker to another client, the regulator noted.
Further, F6 Finserve pledged the securities belonging to its clients to its lenders, it added.
Accordingly, the regulator said, ''Noticees No. 1 to 4, 9 and 10 (F6 Finserve, F6 Commodities, Pankaj Goel, Meenu Goel, Deepak Goel and Ruchika Goel) are hereby restrained from accessing the securities market in any manner and are also prohibited from buying, selling or otherwise dealing in the securities market, directly or indirectly in any manner whatsoever manner, for a period of 5 years''.
(With PTI inputs)
