CARS Partner Gary Swiman Quoted in The Wall Street Journal

Gary Swiman, partner with EisnerAmper’s Compliance and Regulatory Services (CARS) group, was quoted in The Wall Street Journal’s Risk & Compliance Section on July 1 in an article on the factors behind prosecution of chief compliance officers  titled “The Morning Risk Report: SEC Debates Itself Over CCO Enforcement Actions.”

Here is an excerpt from the article:

Gary Swiman, a partner in the compliance and regulatory services practice at accounting firm EisnerAmper, said he thinks claims the SEC is targeting compliance officers are overblown. He said the eight cases in 2014 where SEC enforcement actions were taken all dealt with obvious rules violations or dereliction of duties, or involved compliance officers who also served in other roles within the organization. “Every single case had very aggravating circumstance as to why that CCO was charged,” he said. Compliance officers who serve in dual roles had best make sure they understand what their role is as compliance officer, or else they need to bring in someone who can do that job, said Mr. Swiman. Before rule changes that took away the compliance exemption for broker-dealers, many of these executives didn’t have to spend so much time and effort on compliance. “Once the private exemption disappeared, they saw they had a bullseye on their head and said I don’t need that,” said Mr. Swiman. “Document what you do, have reasonable policies and procedures and I don’t think that you have anything to worry about.”

Here is the link to The Wall Street Journal article:

http://blogs.wsj.com/riskandcompliance/2015/07/01/the-morning-risk-report-sec-debates-itself-over-cco-enforcement-actions-newsletter-draft/

Stay tuned for CARS’ Inaugural CCO Roundtable this Fall.