B.C. executive given half-million-dollar fine, ban from market activities over illegal distribution of services

The TSX ticker is shown in Toronto on May 10, 2013. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn)

A Metro Vancouver executive has been ordered to pay half a million dollars for illegally distributed securities.

Winter Huang, also known as Dong Huang, received the administrative penalty following a review by the B.C. Securities Commission. He's also been banned from "various market activities," the BCSC said in a news release Tuesday.

According to the BCSC, Huang was president and director of a high-tech biopharmaceutical company called Pegasus. He was also the director of another company called Careseng, which the BCSC says has since been dissolved.

Huang was ordered to resign from any position he holds as a director or officer of an issuer or registrant, and is prohibited for 10 years from activities including taking on those roles again, or acting as a promoter.

The panel said Pegasus distributed more than 1,400 bonds – worth about US$45 million – to investors in Taiwan between 2010 and 2012.

During the same time period, Careseng was guaranteeing the repayment of the principal of 447 bonds, worth about US$12.8 million, the BCSC said.

"The securities were all issued without a prospectus, a formal document that explains the details of an investment and the risks involved," the commission said in a statement.

"Neither the companies nor the investors qualified for an exemption from the prospectus requirement under the Securities Act. As a result, Huang, Pegasus and Careseng illegally distributed securities."