AAT shortens financial adviser's five-year ban

Financial adviser Christian Henry has scored a partial win in reducing ASIC's five-year ban on providing personal financial advice to three years upon appeal.

Henry was initially banned by ASIC over advice failures linked to recommendations of a managed fund to three client groups in 2023, while he was on probation at his new practice.

The ban took effect on 28 November 2025.

Henry was also banned from controlling an entity that carries on a financial services business and performing any function involved in the carrying on of a financial services business, such as an officer, manager, employee, contract or in some other capacity.

The AAT yesterday cut the banning period to three years. However, it did not prohibit him from maintaining a passive ownership interest in BNR Financial Services from the date of the orders until 31 August 2026 or from taking any steps involved in divesting his interest in that entity.

Henry worked at Endorphin Wealth for 12 months before moving to Orion Financial Planning in March 2023 and then to BNR Financial Services, according to LinkedIn.

"ASIC has not alleged dishonesty, fraud, or intentional misconduct in my case. The concerns raised relate to compliance and competence judgements, not integrity. I accept both parts of that: I am relieved there are no integrity findings, and I am accountable for the compliance shortcomings that did occur," Henry said in a statement in response to the revised banning order.

Henry produced three advice documents within a 17-day window, recommending a managed fund to the three client groups.

"That fund had been approved at every relevant level of the financial services chain: the licensee, the platform, the superannuation trustee, and an independent research house. It has since become the subject of regulatory stop orders, liquidity concerns, and ultimately a collapse that has affected thousands of Australian investors," he wrote.

Michael Chapman, a director at Mackay Chapman and Henry's legal representative, said Henry was a relatively junior adviser on probation at the time and operated under strict supervision within his licensee.

Each Statement of Advice (SoA) he prepared was subject to mandatory pre-vet compliance checks and approved before being presented to clients.

"In imposing a five-year ban initially, ASIC's original decision arguably created a misalignment between individual accountability and the systematic failures that enabled the conduct. The consent outcome corrects that misalignment," Chapman said, adding the case raises broader questions about proportionality in ASIC's enforcement approach and the allocation of accountability across the advice and product distribution chain.