A private pensions firm has been fined €160,000 by the financial services regulator for a series of alleged breaches.

The Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) fined MC Trustees following an inspection earlier this year.

Announcing the fine, the authority said the company had failed to adhere to its obligations in terms of a number of provisions of the Special Funds (Regulation) Act, the Retirement Pensions Act, the Trusts and Trustees Act and the trustees’ code of conduct.

The company has the right to appeal the MFSA decision, which was first announced on April 16.

The MC Trustees’ local director is former MP Noel Buttigieg Scicluna. A lawyer by profession, he had once served as Malta’s ambassador to Denmark, Hungary and Austria and non-resident ambassador to Sweden, Finland, Norway and Hungary. He was a Nationalist MP between 1982 and 1987.

Buttigieg Scicluna was in the news last year when the authorities in Angola compiled a list of at least 10 Maltese companies they believe Isabel dos Santos, the billionaire daughter of a former African dictator, may have used to siphon money out of state enterprises.

One of those companies, Wise Intelligence Solutions Limited (WISL), had been administered by Buttigieg Scicluna.

MC Trustees’ other director is UK national Daniel Dane.

Meanwhile, the financial services watchdog said that, among the breaches identified, the company had failed to ensure that the individual member accounts were adequately liquid at all times as required at law.

The company had also failed to meet its obligations when it did not ensure that all instructions and decisions affecting the private pensions scheme were in conformity with the law.

Nor had MC Trustees implemented adequate procedures for the effective handling of complaints. This, the MFSA said, led to inconsistencies when classifying complaints as well as discrepancies in the record keeping of complaints.