The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has barred a Massachusetts registered representative from the brokerage industry for cheating on required tests by employing an “imposter” to take them for him.

A Finra hearing panel imposed the sanction after Matthew R. Logan admitted that he directed his assistant to help him cheat on the exams after lying about it when first confronted by his firm, Finra said.

Logan, who had been registered with Hornor, Townsend & Kent (HTK), an RIA owned by Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company, from 2010 to his termination in 2019, had sought leniency from the hearing panel, claiming that his office had to address pressing and urgent matters and was chronically understaffed, and that he does little securities business, Finra said. Logan also claimed that the sales target for the office to generate life premiums had jumped from $300,000 in 2013 to $1.5 million in 2018 and that, on average, he worked 60 hours per week, Finra said.

Logan first skipped training in October 2017, when he was required to take a three-module ethics course. Finra said he was reminded about it in an email from HTK, which he forwarded to his assistant’s company e-mail and stated, “We need this done today.” Finra said that the assistant took each module for Logan by logging onto the firm’s online training portal using his credentials.

In May 2018, the assistant was forwarded an email Logan had received from HTK’s licensing and on-boarding director reminding him of another mandatory course titled, “HTK Processing Checks and Securities Training.” The director wanted to know when Logan had completed the course so that she could delete him from her list, Finra said. Logan sent the email to his assistant, asking, “Is this completed?” to which the assistant replied, “Not yet will complete today,” Finra said. The assistant took the HTK training by logging onto the firm’s web-based learning resource center using Logan’s credentials, Finra said.

In October 2018, the assistant was again instructed by Logan to complete for him several anti-money-laundering continuing education courses provided by Limra, a requirement for selling life insurance products, Finra said. Once again, the assistant took the training for Logan by logging onto Limra’s online testing portal using his credentials, the regulator said.

Finra said Logan's use of the assistant for taking exams was discovered through a routine email review in November 2018 by the firm's supervision department.

When confronted by the firm, both Logan and the assistant gave the same false testimony, essentially claiming that she would log him in on her computer and then he would complete the training on her computer in his office between meetings, Finra said.

“Cheating on the Regulatory Element is analogous to cheating on a Finra qualification examination. Both forms of misconduct violate the high ethical standards of Finra Rule 2010,” Finra said.

In addition to being barred, Logan was ordered to pay $2,466, consisting of a $750 administrative fee and $1,716 for the cost of the hearing transcript, Finra said.