Steele Vincent Stephens, an investment broker who has sold $1.69 billion in bonds to Arkansas’ treasurer’s office, has resigned from his place of employment.
Stephens’ departure from St. Bernard Financial Services of Russellville was listed as “voluntary” on a “Uniform Termination Notice for Securities Industry Registration.”
Stephens has had one major client in the past five years — the state of Arkansas — the head of the state’s Securities Department said Monday.
In the past five years, Stephens has sold $1.69 billion in bonds to the treasurer’s office, according to legislative auditors who examined the treasurer’s books. That is more than double the amount that the office, headed by state Treasurer Martha Shoffner, has purchased from any other broker, the audit disclosed.
That total includes sales in 2008 and 2009, when Stephens worked for Apple Tree Investments of Little Rock, to the present, including his work at St. Bernard Financial Services. Stephens began working for St. Bernard in June 2009.
Stephens became a licensed broker in Arkansas in 1985 when he started working with Boykin Sparks & Associates of Little Rock, according to his history on file with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, a private corporation that is a regulatory organization of the securities industry.
He has had no customer complaints filed against him in the 28 years he has been an investment dealer.
He passed the Arkansas securities exam in 1985 and later passed three general industry product exams and a branch-manager exam.
Read tomorrow's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.
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