Hong Kong's Securities and Futures Commission has fined Standard Chartered Securities (Hong Kong) Ltd. HK$2.6 million for internal control failures relating to short selling orders.

The regulator said Dec. 18 that Standard Chartered Securities failed to put in adequate system and control procedures from January 2014 to August 2015, which led to at least 61 instances of regulatory breaches related to short sales executed by 11 traders from different trading desks.

The securities company was also found to have misinterpreted and breached the Securities and Futures (Financial Resources) Rules, including the amounts receivable from its clearing agent, Standard Chartered Bank (Hong Kong) Ltd., as liquid assets in its financial returns from January to September 2015.

Standard Chartered Securities had a required liquid capital deficit of HK$2 billion when the receivables from the clearing agent were excluded from its liquid assets.