FINRA Announces Arbitration Task Force

WASHINGTON — The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) announced today the formation of a 13-member Arbitration Task Force to consider possible enhancements to its arbitration forum to improve the transparency, impartiality and efficiency of FINRA’s securities arbitration forum for all participants.

“FINRA’s mission is to protect investors and support their confidence in the capital markets,” said Richard Ketchum, FINRA Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “Arbitration plays an essential role in establishing a fair, timely and cost-effective process for resolving disputes between investors and brokers.  This task force brings together a diverse group of leading investor advocates, academics, regulators and industry representatives, and I am confident that their recommendations will help ensure FINRA’s arbitration process continues to serve the needs of the investing public.”

The task force is comprised of seven public members and six industry members.

• Barbara Black – Professor and Director, Corporate Law Center, University of Cincinnati College of Law (Chair)
• Philip Aidikoff – investor attorney, Aidikoff, Uhl & Bakhtiari
• Joseph Borg – Director, Alabama Securities Commission
• Philip Cottone – FINRA non-public arbitrator and mediator
• John Cullem – FINRA public arbitrator
• Sandra Grannum – industry attorney, Davidson & Grannum
• Mark Maddox – investor attorney, Maddox Hargett & Caruso
• Kevin Miller – General Counsel & Chief Compliance Officer, Securities America
• Joseph Peiffer – investor attorney, Peiffer Rosca Abdullah Carr & Kane
• Barbara Roper – Director of Investor Protection, Consumer Federation of America
• Lisa Roth – CEO, Keystone Capital Corporation
• Edward Turan – Managing Director, Citigroup Global Markets
• Harry Walters – Managing Director, Morgan Stanley Wealth Management

Linda Fienberg, President of FINRA Dispute Resolution, said, “We have assembled a top-notch group with diverse experience that will guide their recommendations for the future of the forum.”

At the conclusion of its review next year, the task force will make recommendations to the National Arbitration and Mediation Committee (NAMC), FINRA’s Standing Board Advisory Committee.

FINRA, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, is the largest independent regulator for all securities firms doing business in the United States. FINRA is dedicated to investor protection and market integrity through effective and efficient regulation and complementary compliance and technology-based services. FINRA touches virtually every aspect of the securities business—from registering and educating all industry participants to examining securities firms, writing rules, enforcing those rules and the federal securities laws, informing and educating the investing public, providing trade reporting and other industry utilities, and administering the largest dispute resolution forum for investors and firms. For more information, please visit www.finra.org.