BrokeAndBroker.com Blog by Bill Singer Esq WEEK IN REVIEW

June 17, 2023

https://www.brokeandbroker.com/7094/bill-singer-finra-board-boycott/
FINRA's Board of Governors is a lackluster amalgamation that is tone deaf to the legitimate needs of its smaller members and resistant to implementing the necessary reforms to protect the investing public and the industry's financial professionals. FINRA's Small Firm members represent some 90% of the membership but are gerrymandered down to about 13% of the Board Governors. Since the Small Firm Members are of no apparent consequence, I urge the Small Firm community to boycott all 2023 FINRA elections. Further, until such time as FINRA demonstrates a sincere commitment to reform, I urge all FINRA member firms to instruct their Executive Representative to not cast a vote for any candidate in any 2023 FINRA election by way of a boycott. 
 
https://www.brokeandbroker.com/7093/finra-schwab-arbitration/
Why would someone go to all the trouble of suing someone else but then ghost the trial? Mind you, there may be some fair explanations, such as the Plaintiff is dead, or the Claimant is home sick, or there was an emergency. Then again, sometimes folks just decide to stay home and the hell with going to court. In a recent FINRA Arbitration, about four years after a public customer sued her brokerage firm, her lawyer showed up at the hearing but his client, well, not so much.
 
https://www.brokeandbroker.com/7082/mummert-nyse-finra-sec-expungement/
A quarter of a century ago in 1998, two public customers sued a New York Stock Exchange member and one of its registered persons. In 2020, the registered person sought to clear his name and filed a FINRA Arbitration Statement of Claim seeking expungement. His FINRA Arbitration moved forward. Until it didn't. FINRA pulled the plug on Christmas Eve 2020. In the midst of the onslaught of the Covid pandemic. The registered person appealed to the SEC. And, now, in 2023, we're moving backwards. Or sideways. Or who knows -- perhaps we're headed back to the future.