SYDNEY, Australia–Australia’s financial services company regulator said Wednesday that its disqualification of two former Zurich Australia executives—or banning them from holding senior posts in the insurance market—has been upheld on appeal.

The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority said the Administrative Appeals Tribunal decided July 31 to uphold APRA’s 2007 decision to disqualify John Butler and Alan Parsonson.

APRA disqualified Mr. Butler, who held a number of positions including chief executive officer at Zurich Australia Insurance Ltd., and Mr. Parsonson, who was a director of ZAIL as well as Zurich Financial Services Australia Ltd., for their roles in two financial reinsurance transactions with General & Cologne Re Group Australia in 2000.

APRA said the transactions made it appear that ZAIL met its regulatory solvency requirement when, in fact, it did not. The Sydney, Australia-based financial services regulator said the transactions overstated ZAIL’s 2000 profits by $61 million.

“Their otherwise distinguished careers and reputation do not sufficiently redeem them, particularly in the circumstances that they continue to maintain the propriety of their conduct, although accepting that, with hindsight, it might have been done differently,” AAT President Justice Garry Downes said in the ruling that rejected the men’s appeal.