The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has suspended and fined a Raymond James advisor who skirted the firm’s policy and accepted monetary gifts totaling $477,000 from an elderly widowed customer.

Jerry Rice of Tinton Falls, N.J., also failed to disclose that he was named a beneficiary in the customer's will, Finra said.

According to Finra's letter of acceptance, waiver and consent, Rice, who had been a registered representative with Raymond James since 1999, circumvented the firm’s written procedures, which prohibits representatives from receiving gifts from customers or being named as a beneficiary in a customer's will.

Finra said that beginning in October 2013, Rice's customer, an 89-year-old widow, began giving him monetary gifts and continued to through January 2019. Rice collected a total of $477,000, some of which was made to his immediate family members.

In annual compliance questionnaires he filled out between 2013 and 2017, Rice, according to Finra, said he understood that representatives were not permitted to receive gifts of more than $100 per person, per year, without written preapproval from the firm. The agency added that Rice did not request permission to receive the gifts, nor did he disclose them to Raymond James. And Finra said Rice failed to disclose on the compliance questionnaires in 2018 and 2019 that he had received gifts totaling more than $100 in the previous year.

Rice was also aware by October 2013 that he had been named a beneficiary in his customer’s will, Finra said, adding that he failed to disclose this to his firm, despite saying in compliance questionnaires that he understood representatives were not permitted to be named as beneficiaries of the estate of any customer who was not a relative.

Rice, who has been registered with Finra and its predecessor agency since 1970, voluntarily resigned from Raymond James on November 15, 2019, according to a Uniform Termination Notice for Securities Industry Registration (Form U5) that the firm initially filed. The firm filed an amended Form U5 on November 27, 2019, however, stating that “Rice was under review in connection with the conduct described herein.”

Rice was suspended for six months from associating with any Finra member in all capacities and fined $10,000 for violating Finra Rule 2010, which “requires associated persons to observe high standards of commercial honor and just and equitable principles of trade.”

Rice accepted the suspension and fine without admitting to or denying Finra's findings.

(The headline for an earlier version of this story misstated the value of gifts accepted by Rice.)