Miriam Lefkowitz

Miriam Lefkowitz is a Bates Consulting and Testifying Expert with more than 25 years of professional experience in broker-dealer and investment adviser securities regulations and compliance.  She has hands-on experience protecting and defending firms as an in-house legal and compliance professional, as private securities law defense counsel and as an independent compliance consultant and expert witness.  (See, e.g., Initial Decision in In the Matter of The Robare Group, Ltd., Mark L. Robare and Jack L. Jones, Jr. (June 4, 2015), in which the Administrative Law Judge quoted Miriam extensively in dismissing all claims against the respondents.)  Miriam has also seen the other side of the industry, having served as an enforcement attorney for the SEC.

From 2002-2019, she continuously served as the General Counsel (or Chief Legal Officer) and senior compliance and regulatory advisor (often as CCO) to small and regional SEC-registered, retail-focused, dually registered investment advisers and broker dealers.  One of the firms was an independent contractor firm that specialized in financial planning, model portfolio asset management utilizing mutual funds and ETFs, and variable annuities.  The second firm allocated equities in discretionary separately managed accounts.  The third firm specialized in municipal bonds and third-party managers.  Due to the size of the firms, Miriam was not only a senior member of each firm, she was also actively involved in and had direct experience with regulatory disclosures (Form ADV, Form BD, Forms U4 and U5, etc.), development of all compliance procedures and supervisory controls, internal investigations, complaint resolution, branch examinations, annual reviews, risk assessments, supervision of trades, customer communications, among other things.  As the senior legal officer, Miriam was also involved in all aspects of governance, including training the directors, developing and serving (or advising) on management committees including conflicts of interest, risk management, data security, etc.

Miriam was on the board of directors of the National Society of Compliance Professionals (NSCP), a leading industry organization dedicated to serving and advancing the needs of financial services compliance professionals, from 2014-2019, and served as its Chair from 2017-2018.  She also served as senior member of the Association of Corporate Counsel’s (ACC) Financial Services Committee for several years, most recently as its chair from 2016-2017.  She remains active in the NSCP’s Governance, Regulatory Affairs, Broker-Dealer, Investment Adviser and Regulation Best Interest and is the co-chair of the Publications Committee.

Miriam regularly speaks on a broad range of securities and compliance topics for a number of industry groups, including FINRA.  Among other topics, Miriam has presented or published on Regulation Best Interest, Form CRS, investment adviser fiduciary duties, due diligence, best practices for senior investors, internal investigations, custody, Form ADV, conducting effective examinations, suitability, outside business activities, identity theft prevention and anti-money laundering.