Canadian stock promoter Alexander barred again

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - A Canadian stock promoter at the center of the tumultuous rise and fall of Arakis Energy Corp in the 1990s has again been slapped with a securities ban, regulators said on Wednesday.

The British Columbia Securities Commission permanently barred James "Terry" Alexander from trading stock or being a company director for violating a 1999 order that had already prohibited him from that for 20 years.

He was also fined C$200,000 ($201,370).

The commission ruled in October that Alexander breached the order by serving as director or officer of seven companies. He also directed the investment activities of a holding company through an assistant.

Alexander was chief executive of Arakis Energy in the 1990s when the oil explorer's shares on Nasdaq skyrocketed after announcing it had arranged financing for a pipeline to ship oil from its project in Sudan.

At its height in 1995, Arakis shares had a market value of about $1 billion, but the financing failed to materialize and the company's shares plummeted.

Alexander admitted in 1999 to improper insider trading and was fined C$1.2 million in addition to receiving the trading ban. He was also convicted by a provincial court in 2005 of violating the 1999 ban.

($1=$0.99 Canadian)

(Reporting by Allan Dowd; Editing by Rob Wilson)