A White Plains financial services professional has been sanctioned for forging signatures on insurance documents.
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority suspended Brian R. Baine from associating with any member for three months and fined him $5,000, on July 1. The action was disclosed in the organization’s November monthly report.
FINRA says Baine, of Rye, violated a rule that requires members to “observe high standards of commercial honor and just and equitable principles of trade.”
Baine represented Northwestern Mutual Investment Services in White Plains, from 2008 until 2023, when Northwestern permitted him to resign while it reviewed how he handled insurance documents.
Last year, the Connecticut Insurance Department placed him on probation for one year and fined him $1,000 for failing to report that his FINRA registration had been terminated, thus making him ineligible to handle variable life and variable annuity insurance policies.
From March 2022 to July 2023, Baine signed, or caused other people to sign, the names of eight customers on 20 insurance documents. He did so to expedite insurance policy applications, according to FINRA, and not in furtherance of other misconduct, and none of his customers complained.
Baine began his career as a general securities representative in 1985 with Solomon Brothers Inc. in Manhattan. He went on to work for Lehman Brothers; McMahan Securities Co. in Greenwich; Connecticut, and Constans Crescent Global in Norwalk, Connecticut.
Although he was not registered with FINRA or associated with any FINRA member after October 2023, the nonprofit, self-regulatory organization says it retained jurisdiction over him.
The three-month suspension ended on Oct. 6.
