Alan Wolper

Alan focuses his practice exclusively on defending regulatory investigations and enforcement actions brought by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), the United States Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC), and state securities commissioners against brokers, broker-dealers, and investment auditors. He was previously Director of the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) Atlanta District Office, where he oversaw nearly 600 member firms and thousands of branch offices. Alan also served as a member of the NASD's Department of Enforcement, where he had the primary responsibility for prosecuting hundreds of formal disciplinary actions.

Firm/Organization: Ulmer & Berne LLP

Blogs: Broker- Dealer Law Corner

Latest Articles

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

Make No Mistake, PIABA Cares About One Thing: Getting Paid

By Alan Wolper on July 11, 2019

If you read this blog even semi-regularly, you know that I have taken a few shots at PIABA. I think they’re well earned, but some people – particularly PIABA lawyers, not surprisingly – have suggested that I’m overdoing it. Well, if you ever had any doubt that the motivation behind pretty much everything that PIABA does is simply doing whatever it can to ensure that its attorneys get paid, just take a look at PIABA’s …

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

A Glaring Example Of FINRA Dragging Its Feet, Culminating In A Pointless Default Decision

By Alan Wolper on July 1, 2019

FINRA loves to tout its supposed intent to bring meaningful cases, cases that matter to the investing public, rather than enforcing “foot faults,” as it has been accused of doing over the years. My own experience with FINRA suggests that while it talks a big game, in reality, we all still live in foot-fault city. I stumbled across this decision recently, and it serves as a good example of two problems that FINRA has. First,…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

Implicit Recommendations To Hold: FINRA’s Suitability Rule Goes Toe-To-Toe With SEC’s Regulation BI

By Alan Wolper on June 25, 2019

Nearly ten years ago, FINRA decided to update its old suitability rule, NASD Rule 2310. It had been around a long time, and while it seemed to work fine, FINRA decided to incorporate into the new amended rule – FINRA Rule 2111 – some new concepts. One such concept concerned recommendations to hold. Under the old rule, only recommendations to purchase, sell or exchange a security had to be suitable. Under the new rule, FINRA…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

FINRA Touts The Fact That Its Examinations Need Not Be “Fair”

By Alan Wolper on May 31, 2019

While I feel I have enjoyed as much success defending respondents in FINRA Enforcement matters as anyone, I am still careful to caution clients who are unwilling to consider any settlement that going toe-to-toe with FINRA at a hearing is always a difficult proposition, even though they are presumed innocent and FINRA bears the burden of proof. No matter the facts, no matter the allegations, magically, decisions by the Hearing Officer, and by the panel…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

FINRA Proposes To Dispense With Due Process, All Because It’s Failed To Do Its Job Of Policing The Markets

By Alan Wolper on May 7, 2019

Reading Reg Notice 19-17 makes me think of the legal arguments that I’ve recently read regarding whether a president can be found guilty of obstructing justice if the actions in question were taken out in the open, for everyone to see. Here, FINRA’s proposed power grab is simply outrageous, but, you got to give them credit, it is certainly being done right out there for everyone to see. It doesn’t make it right, however, no…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

FINRA’s Proposal On High-Risk Firms Is A Must-Read, But Hardly A Must-Enjoy

By Alan Wolper on May 3, 2019

I apologize for all the posts this week, but I am traveling and am in a different time zone, so I am awake at hours when, ordinarily, I would be asleep, giving me time to muse. Anyway, given that, I will not test your willingness to indulge my random thoughts a third time in one week. But…you ought to be aware of what FINRA did yesterday, when it published Reg Notice 19-17. As I…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

Voya Settlement Shows That Self-Reporting To FINRA Can Pay Off

By Alan Wolper on May 2, 2019

I have written before about the troubling lack of clarity regarding the tangible benefit of self-reporting rule violations to FINRA. While FINRA purports to provide some potential advantage for doing so, it is so awfully loosy-goosy that it remains a relatively uncommon occurrence. That’s why when a case comes down that provides some clear indication (1) that there is, in fact, a benefit of self-reporting, and (2) what that self-reporting must look like to actually…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

The Folly Of ADV Disclosures: What The Robare Decision Teaches About Trying To Do It Right

By Alan Wolper on May 1, 2019

Most of the time, the cases I write about were some other lawyer’s. In some respects, it’s easier to offer comments when it isn’t my case. I can, hopefully, be more objective, less pissed off (when the result is one I disagree with, of course), and content merely to mine the case for interesting lessons applicable to all my readers. This post, however, is entirely personal. It concerns a case that my colleague and partner,…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

FINRA AWC Includes Waiver Of A Fine: Is This A Sign Of Good Things To Come?

By Alan Wolper on April 28, 2019

Way back in 2006, NASD issued Notice to Members 06-55, which tweaked the Sanction Guidelines to allow not just the size of the firm to be taken into consideration when determining the appropriate sanctions to be meted out, but, more importantly, how well, or how poorly, the firm is doing on its income statement. Specifically, the NTM resulted in a change to the Guidelines that explicitly permitted the consideration of “the amount of the…

Broker- Dealer Law Corner

The SEC Released A Risk Alert On Reg S-P, a/k/a How To Avoid A $1 Million Penalty

By Alan Wolper on April 23, 2019

I am hardly saying that SEC Regulation S-P is the sexiest of regulations. I mean, has any customer is history actually read one of those exciting statement stuffers that discloses in some dense font a BD’s privacy policy? Likely not, but, nevertheless, it remains that in this day and age, with hacking and phishing and cybersecurity a part of the everyday vernacular, Reg S-P is something that BDs cannot afford to be even slightly unfamiliar…

Alan Wolper

Make No Mistake, PIABA Cares About One Thing: Getting Paid

A Glaring Example Of FINRA Dragging Its Feet, Culminating In A Pointless Default Decision

Implicit Recommendations To Hold: FINRA’s Suitability Rule Goes Toe-To-Toe With SEC’s Regulation BI

FINRA Touts The Fact That Its Examinations Need Not Be “Fair”

FINRA Proposes To Dispense With Due Process, All Because It’s Failed To Do Its Job Of Policing The Markets

FINRA’s Proposal On High-Risk Firms Is A Must-Read, But Hardly A Must-Enjoy

Voya Settlement Shows That Self-Reporting To FINRA Can Pay Off

The Folly Of ADV Disclosures: What The Robare Decision Teaches About Trying To Do It Right

FINRA AWC Includes Waiver Of A Fine: Is This A Sign Of Good Things To Come?

The SEC Released A Risk Alert On Reg S-P, a/k/a How To Avoid A $1 Million Penalty

Company

Support

New to the Network