Mitch Atkins, founder and principal of FirstMark Regulatory Solutions, will present at the FINRA South Region Compliance Seminar in Fort Lauderdale, Florida on December 6, 2017.  Mitch Atkins will present as a panelist on FINRA’s panel entitled Writing and Maintaining Written Supervisory Procedures. The panel will discuss the FINRA’s Supervision Rule (Rule 3110), and in particular, best practices for developing effective supervisory and compliance procedures. As a panelist, Atkins will discuss the regulatory requirements for procedures, and will provide take-away resource materials to attendees that will serve as a guide for developing procedures, including procedures for FINRA’s new Rule 2165 on financial exploitation of seniors/specified adults.

One of the most commonly cited violations on FINRA examinations is the failure to develop and implement adequate written supervisory procedures (“WSPs”). Beyond simply satisfying regulatory requirements, effective WSPs are a compliance tool that broker-dealers utilize to delegate responsibilities for compliance with FINRA and SEC rules. Additionally, effective WSPs do more than simply state the requirements of a particular rule, rather, they serve as a blueprint of the firm’s supervisory system. A supervisory system collectively includes the processes, technology, personnel and related documentation. Before engaging in the development of WSPs a firm should first carefully consider all aspects of an overall supervisory system. Lastly, an effective supervisory system includes clear lines of authority. There have been numerous regulatory enforcement actions which cited firms for failure to designate authority, or worse, in which a problem arose, but the lines of authority were blurred such that nothing was done to correct the problem. In some of these cases, the identification of the problem was not the issue so much as who was responsible for the resolution of the issue. These issues will be covered by the panel, which includes industry and regulator participation. The FINRA South Region Conference is a cost-effective way to gain additional knowledge in this and many other areas.

To register, please visit http://www.finra.org/industry/2017-south-region-compliance-seminar 

FirstMark offers a broad range of compliance consulting services, including AML independent testing, Rule 3120 supervisory controls testing, SRO relationship management, FINRA membership applications, training, and more. Mitch Atkins founded FirstMark in 2013.

For more information and to view the seminar brochure and agenda, simply click the image below.

Update: To view the session materials, click the image below: