Two directors of Agoracom will pay a total of $150,000 and face trading and employment restrictions under a settlement agreement that was approved Friday by Ontario's securities regulator.

Agoracom, which runs a website that does investor relations for public companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and TSX Venture Exchange, will also post a notice about the settlement on www.Agoracom.com.

Agoracom founder George Tsiolis and dealer Apostolis (Paul) Kondakos acknowledged they required Agoracom staff to use hundreds of fake names and pose as investors in thousands of messages on the firm's public online forums.

Kondakos, the firm's chief compliance officer, also intercepted private messages between public users of the forum from July 2008 to February 2009 to gather information about companies in which he was invested.

Under the settlement agreement, the Ontario Securities Commission has suspended the two men's registrations as investment professionals for 10 years.

They are also permanently prohibited from being a director or officer of any client of Agoracom or its affiliates and prohibited from being a director or officer of any public company, registrant or investment fund manager for five years.

They also aren't allowed to trade or invest in any client of Agoracom.

The two men will pay a total of $25,000 towards the costs of the OSC investigation and $125,000 to a fund administered by the commission.